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diff --git a/old/cotrt10h.htm b/old/cotrt10h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7c69c7a --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cotrt10h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4644 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII"> +<title>The Castle of Otranto</title> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">The Castle of Otranto, by Horace Walpole</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Castle of Otranto, by Horace Walpole +(#1 in our series by Horace Walpole) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Castle of Otranto + +Author: Horace Walpole + +Release Date: October, 1996 [EBook #696] +[This file was first posted on October 22, 1996] +[Most recently updated: September 8, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII +</pre> +<p> +<a name="startoftext"></a> +Transcribed from the 1901 Cassell and Company edition by David Price, +email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +THE CASTLE OF OTRANTO<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +The following work was found in the library of an ancient Catholic family +in the north of England. It was printed at Naples, in the black +letter, in the year 1529. How much sooner it was written does +not appear. The principal incidents are such as were believed +in the darkest ages of Christianity; but the language and conduct have +nothing that savours of barbarism. The style is the purest Italian.<br> +<br> +If the story was written near the time when it is supposed to have happened, +it must have been between 1095, the era of the first Crusade, and 1243, +the date of the last, or not long afterwards. There is no other +circumstance in the work that can lead us to guess at the period in +which the scene is laid: the names of the actors are evidently fictitious, +and probably disguised on purpose: yet the Spanish names of the domestics +seem to indicate that this work was not composed until the establishment +of the Arragonian Kings in Naples had made Spanish appellations familiar +in that country. The beauty of the diction, and the zeal of the +author (moderated, however, by singular judgment) concur to make me +think that the date of the composition was little antecedent to that +of the impression. Letters were then in their most flourishing +state in Italy, and contributed to dispel the empire of superstition, +at that time so forcibly attacked by the reformers. It is not +unlikely that an artful priest might endeavour to turn their own arms +on the innovators, and might avail himself of his abilities as an author +to confirm the populace in their ancient errors and superstitions. +If this was his view, he has certainly acted with signal address. +Such a work as the following would enslave a hundred vulgar minds beyond +half the books of controversy that have been written from the days of +Luther to the present hour.<br> +<br> +This solution of the author’s motives is, however, offered as +a mere conjecture. Whatever his views were, or whatever effects +the execution of them might have, his work can only be laid before the +public at present as a matter of entertainment. Even as such, +some apology for it is necessary. Miracles, visions, necromancy, +dreams, and other preternatural events, are exploded now even from romances. +That was not the case when our author wrote; much less when the story +itself is supposed to have happened. Belief in every kind of prodigy +was so established in those dark ages, that an author would not be faithful +to the manners of the times, who should omit all mention of them. +He is not bound to believe them himself, but he must represent his actors +as believing them.<br> +<br> +If this air of the miraculous is excused, the reader will find nothing +else unworthy of his perusal. Allow the possibility of the facts, +and all the actors comport themselves as persons would do in their situation. +There is no bombast, no similes, flowers, digressions, or unnecessary +descriptions. Everything tends directly to the catastrophe. +Never is the reader’s attention relaxed. The rules of the +drama are almost observed throughout the conduct of the piece. +The characters are well drawn, and still better maintained. Terror, +the author’s principal engine, prevents the story from ever languishing; +and it is so often contrasted by pity, that the mind is kept up in a +constant vicissitude of interesting passions.<br> +<br> +Some persons may perhaps think the characters of the domestics too little +serious for the general cast of the story; but besides their opposition +to the principal personages, the art of the author is very observable +in his conduct of the subalterns. They discover many passages +essential to the story, which could not be well brought to light but +by their <i>naïveté</i> and simplicity. In particular, +the womanish terror and foibles of Bianca, in the last chapter, conduce +essentially towards advancing the catastrophe.<br> +<br> +It is natural for a translator to be prejudiced in favour of his adopted +work. More impartial readers may not be so much struck with the +beauties of this piece as I was. Yet I am not blind to my author’s +defects. I could wish he had grounded his plan on a more useful +moral than this: that “the sins of fathers are visited on their +children to the third and fourth generation.” I doubt whether, +in his time, any more than at present, ambition curbed its appetite +of dominion from the dread of so remote a punishment. And yet +this moral is weakened by that less direct insinuation, that even such +anathema may be diverted by devotion to St. Nicholas. Here the +interest of the Monk plainly gets the better of the judgment of the +author. However, with all its faults, I have no doubt but the +English reader will be pleased with a sight of this performance. +The piety that reigns throughout, the lessons of virtue that are inculcated, +and the rigid purity of the sentiments, exempt this work from the censure +to which romances are but too liable. Should it meet with the +success I hope for, I may be encouraged to reprint the original Italian, +though it will tend to depreciate my own labour. Our language +falls far short of the charms of the Italian, both for variety and harmony. +The latter is peculiarly excellent for simple narrative. It is +difficult in English to relate without falling too low or rising too +high; a fault obviously occasioned by the little care taken to speak +pure language in common conversation. Every Italian or Frenchman +of any rank piques himself on speaking his own tongue correctly and +with choice. I cannot flatter myself with having done justice +to my author in this respect: his style is as elegant as his conduct +of the passions is masterly. It is a pity that he did not apply +his talents to what they were evidently proper for - the theatre.<br> +<br> +I will detain the reader no longer, but to make one short remark. +Though the machinery is invention, and the names of the actors imaginary, +I cannot but believe that the groundwork of the story is founded on +truth. The scene is undoubtedly laid in some real castle. +The author seems frequently, without design, to describe particular +parts. “The chamber,” says he, “on the right +hand;” “the door on the left hand;” “the distance +from the chapel to Conrad’s apartment:” these and other +passages are strong presumptions that the author had some certain building +in his eye. Curious persons, who have leisure to employ in such +researches, may possibly discover in the Italian writers the foundation +on which our author has built. If a catastrophe, at all resembling +that which he describes, is believed to have given rise to this work, +it will contribute to interest the reader, and will make the “Castle +of Otranto” a still more moving story.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +SONNET TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LADY MARY COKE.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +The gentle maid, whose hapless tale<br> +These melancholy pages speak;<br> +Say, gracious lady, shall she fail<br> +To draw the tear adown thy cheek?<br> +<br> +No; never was thy pitying breast<br> +Insensible to human woes;<br> +Tender, tho’ firm, it melts distrest<br> +For weaknesses it never knows.<br> +<br> +Oh! guard the marvels I relate<br> +Of fell ambition scourg’d by fate,<br> +From reason’s peevish blame.<br> +Blest with thy smile, my dauntless sail<br> +I dare expand to Fancy’s gale,<br> +For sure thy smiles are Fame.<br> +<br> +H. W.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +CHAPTER I.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Manfred, Prince of Otranto, had one son and one daughter: the latter, +a most beautiful virgin, aged eighteen, was called Matilda. Conrad, +the son, was three years younger, a homely youth, sickly, and of no +promising disposition; yet he was the darling of his father, who never +showed any symptoms of affection to Matilda. Manfred had contracted +a marriage for his son with the Marquis of Vicenza’s daughter, +Isabella; and she had already been delivered by her guardians into the +hands of Manfred, that he might celebrate the wedding as soon as Conrad’s +infirm state of health would permit.<br> +<br> +Manfred’s impatience for this ceremonial was remarked by his family +and neighbours. The former, indeed, apprehending the severity +of their Prince’s disposition, did not dare to utter their surmises +on this precipitation. Hippolita, his wife, an amiable lady, did +sometimes venture to represent the danger of marrying their only son +so early, considering his great youth, and greater infirmities; but +she never received any other answer than reflections on her own sterility, +who had given him but one heir. His tenants and subjects were +less cautious in their discourses. They attributed this hasty +wedding to the Prince’s dread of seeing accomplished an ancient +prophecy, which was said to have pronounced that the castle and lordship +of Otranto “should pass from the present family, whenever the +real owner should be grown too large to inhabit it.” It +was difficult to make any sense of this prophecy; and still less easy +to conceive what it had to do with the marriage in question. Yet +these mysteries, or contradictions, did not make the populace adhere +the less to their opinion.<br> +<br> +Young Conrad’s birthday was fixed for his espousals. The +company was assembled in the chapel of the Castle, and everything ready +for beginning the divine office, when Conrad himself was missing. +Manfred, impatient of the least delay, and who had not observed his +son retire, despatched one of his attendants to summon the young Prince. +The servant, who had not stayed long enough to have crossed the court +to Conrad’s apartment, came running back breathless, in a frantic +manner, his eyes staring, and foaming at the month. He said nothing, +but pointed to the court.<br> +<br> +The company were struck with terror and amazement. The Princess +Hippolita, without knowing what was the matter, but anxious for her +son, swooned away. Manfred, less apprehensive than enraged at +the procrastination of the nuptials, and at the folly of his domestic, +asked imperiously what was the matter? The fellow made no answer, +but continued pointing towards the courtyard; and at last, after repeated +questions put to him, cried out, “Oh! the helmet! the helmet!”<br> +<br> +In the meantime, some of the company had run into the court, from whence +was heard a confused noise of shrieks, horror, and surprise. Manfred, +who began to be alarmed at not seeing his son, went himself to get information +of what occasioned this strange confusion. Matilda remained endeavouring +to assist her mother, and Isabella stayed for the same purpose, and +to avoid showing any impatience for the bridegroom, for whom, in truth, +she had conceived little affection.<br> +<br> +The first thing that struck Manfred’s eyes was a group of his +servants endeavouring to raise something that appeared to him a mountain +of sable plumes. He gazed without believing his sight.<br> +<br> +“What are ye doing?” cried Manfred, wrathfully; “where +is my son?”<br> +<br> +A volley of voices replied, “Oh! my Lord! the Prince! the Prince! +the helmet! the helmet!”<br> +<br> +Shocked with these lamentable sounds, and dreading he knew not what, +he advanced hastily, - but what a sight for a father’s eyes! - +he beheld his child dashed to pieces, and almost buried under an enormous +helmet, an hundred times more large than any casque ever made for human +being, and shaded with a proportionable quantity of black feathers.<br> +<br> +The horror of the spectacle, the ignorance of all around how this misfortune +had happened, and above all, the tremendous phenomenon before him, took +away the Prince’s speech. Yet his silence lasted longer +than even grief could occasion. He fixed his eyes on what he wished +in vain to believe a vision; and seemed less attentive to his loss, +than buried in meditation on the stupendous object that had occasioned +it. He touched, he examined the fatal casque; nor could even the +bleeding mangled remains of the young Prince divert the eyes of Manfred +from the portent before him.<br> +<br> +All who had known his partial fondness for young Conrad, were as much +surprised at their Prince’s insensibility, as thunderstruck themselves +at the miracle of the helmet. They conveyed the disfigured corpse +into the hall, without receiving the least direction from Manfred. +As little was he attentive to the ladies who remained in the chapel. +On the contrary, without mentioning the unhappy princesses, his wife +and daughter, the first sounds that dropped from Manfred’s lips +were, “Take care of the Lady Isabella.”<br> +<br> +The domestics, without observing the singularity of this direction, +were guided by their affection to their mistress, to consider it as +peculiarly addressed to her situation, and flew to her assistance. +They conveyed her to her chamber more dead than alive, and indifferent +to all the strange circumstances she heard, except the death of her +son.<br> +<br> +Matilda, who doted on her mother, smothered her own grief and amazement, +and thought of nothing but assisting and comforting her afflicted parent. +Isabella, who had been treated by Hippolita like a daughter, and who +returned that tenderness with equal duty and affection, was scarce less +assiduous about the Princess; at the same time endeavouring to partake +and lessen the weight of sorrow which she saw Matilda strove to suppress, +for whom she had conceived the warmest sympathy of friendship. +Yet her own situation could not help finding its place in her thoughts. +She felt no concern for the death of young Conrad, except commiseration; +and she was not sorry to be delivered from a marriage which had promised +her little felicity, either from her destined bridegroom, or from the +severe temper of Manfred, who, though he had distinguished her by great +indulgence, had imprinted her mind with terror, from his causeless rigour +to such amiable princesses as Hippolita and Matilda.<br> +<br> +While the ladies were conveying the wretched mother to her bed, Manfred +remained in the court, gazing on the ominous casque, and regardless +of the crowd which the strangeness of the event had now assembled around +him. The few words he articulated, tended solely to inquiries, +whether any man knew from whence it could have come? Nobody could +give him the least information. However, as it seemed to be the +sole object of his curiosity, it soon became so to the rest of the spectators, +whose conjectures were as absurd and improbable, as the catastrophe +itself was unprecedented. In the midst of their senseless guesses, +a young peasant, whom rumour had drawn thither from a neighbouring village, +observed that the miraculous helmet was exactly like that on the figure +in black marble of Alfonso the Good, one of their former princes, in +the church of St. Nicholas.<br> +<br> +“Villain! What sayest thou?” cried Manfred, starting +from his trance in a tempest of rage, and seizing the young man by the +collar; “how darest thou utter such treason? Thy life shall +pay for it.”<br> +<br> +The spectators, who as little comprehended the cause of the Prince’s +fury as all the rest they had seen, were at a loss to unravel this new +circumstance. The young peasant himself was still more astonished, +not conceiving how he had offended the Prince. Yet recollecting +himself, with a mixture of grace and humility, he disengaged himself +from Manfred’s grip, and then with an obeisance, which discovered +more jealousy of innocence than dismay, he asked, with respect, of what +he was guilty? Manfred, more enraged at the vigour, however decently +exerted, with which the young man had shaken off his hold, than appeased +by his submission, ordered his attendants to seize him, and, if he had +not been withheld by his friends whom he had invited to the nuptials, +would have poignarded the peasant in their arms.<br> +<br> +During this altercation, some of the vulgar spectators had run to the +great church, which stood near the castle, and came back open-mouthed, +declaring that the helmet was missing from Alfonso’s statue. +Manfred, at this news, grew perfectly frantic; and, as if he sought +a subject on which to vent the tempest within him, he rushed again on +the young peasant, crying -<br> +<br> +“Villain! Monster! Sorcerer! ’tis thou hast done this! ’tis +thou hast slain my son!”<br> +<br> +The mob, who wanted some object within the scope of their capacities, +on whom they might discharge their bewildered reasoning, caught the +words from the mouth of their lord, and re-echoed -<br> +<br> +“Ay, ay; ’tis he, ’tis he: he has stolen the helmet +from good Alfonso’s tomb, and dashed out the brains of our young +Prince with it,” never reflecting how enormous the disproportion +was between the marble helmet that had been in the church, and that +of steel before their eyes; nor how impossible it was for a youth seemingly +not twenty, to wield a piece of armour of so prodigious a weight<br> +<br> +The folly of these ejaculations brought Manfred to himself: yet whether +provoked at the peasant having observed the resemblance between the +two helmets, and thereby led to the farther discovery of the absence +of that in the church, or wishing to bury any such rumour under so impertinent +a supposition, he gravely pronounced that the young man was certainly +a necromancer, and that till the Church could take cognisance of the +affair, he would have the Magician, whom they had thus detected, kept +prisoner under the helmet itself, which he ordered his attendants to +raise, and place the young man under it; declaring he should be kept +there without food, with which his own infernal art might furnish him.<br> +<br> +It was in vain for the youth to represent against this preposterous +sentence: in vain did Manfred’s friends endeavour to divert him +from this savage and ill-grounded resolution. The generality were +charmed with their lord’s decision, which, to their apprehensions, +carried great appearance of justice, as the Magician was to be punished +by the very instrument with which he had offended: nor were they struck +with the least compunction at the probability of the youth being starved, +for they firmly believed that, by his diabolic skill, he could easily +supply himself with nutriment.<br> +<br> +Manfred thus saw his commands even cheerfully obeyed; and appointing +a guard with strict orders to prevent any food being conveyed to the +prisoner, he dismissed his friends and attendants, and retired to his +own chamber, after locking the gates of the castle, in which he suffered +none but his domestics to remain.<br> +<br> +In the meantime, the care and zeal of the young Ladies had brought the +Princess Hippolita to herself, who amidst the transports of her own +sorrow frequently demanded news of her lord, would have dismissed her +attendants to watch over him, and at last enjoined Matilda to leave +her, and visit and comfort her father. Matilda, who wanted no +affectionate duty to Manfred, though she trembled at his austerity, +obeyed the orders of Hippolita, whom she tenderly recommended to Isabella; +and inquiring of the domestics for her father, was informed that he +was retired to his chamber, and had commanded that nobody should have +admittance to him. Concluding that he was immersed in sorrow for +the death of her brother, and fearing to renew his tears by the sight +of his sole remaining child, she hesitated whether she should break +in upon his affliction; yet solicitude for him, backed by the commands +of her mother, encouraged her to venture disobeying the orders he had +given; a fault she had never been guilty of before.<br> +<br> +The gentle timidity of her nature made her pause for some minutes at +his door. She heard him traverse his chamber backwards, and forwards +with disordered steps; a mood which increased her apprehensions. +She was, however, just going to beg admittance, when Manfred suddenly +opened the door; and as it was now twilight, concurring with the disorder +of his mind, he did not distinguish the person, but asked angrily, who +it was? Matilda replied, trembling -<br> +<br> +“My dearest father, it is I, your daughter.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, stepping back hastily, cried, “Begone! I do not +want a daughter;” and flinging back abruptly, clapped the door +against the terrified Matilda.<br> +<br> +She was too well acquainted with her father’s impetuosity to venture +a second intrusion. When she had a little recovered the shock +of so bitter a reception, she wiped away her tears to prevent the additional +stab that the knowledge of it would give to Hippolita, who questioned +her in the most anxious terms on the health of Manfred, and how he bore +his loss. Matilda assured her he was well, and supported his misfortune +with manly fortitude.<br> +<br> +“But will he not let me see him?” said Hippolita mournfully; +“will he not permit me to blend my tears with his, and shed a +mother’s sorrows in the bosom of her Lord? Or do you deceive +me, Matilda? I know how Manfred doted on his son: is not the stroke +too heavy for him? has he not sunk under it? You do not answer +me - alas! I dread the worst! - Raise me, my maidens; I will, I will +see my Lord. Bear me to him instantly: he is dearer to me even +than my children.”<br> +<br> +Matilda made signs to Isabella to prevent Hippolita’s rising; +and both those lovely young women were using their gentle violence to +stop and calm the Princess, when a servant, on the part of Manfred, +arrived and told Isabella that his Lord demanded to speak with her.<br> +<br> +“With me!” cried Isabella.<br> +<br> +“Go,” said Hippolita, relieved by a message from her Lord: +“Manfred cannot support the sight of his own family. He +thinks you less disordered than we are, and dreads the shock of my grief. +Console him, dear Isabella, and tell him I will smother my own anguish +rather than add to his.”<br> +<br> +As it was now evening the servant who conducted Isabella bore a torch +before her. When they came to Manfred, who was walking impatiently +about the gallery, he started, and said hastily -<br> +<br> +“Take away that light, and begone.”<br> +<br> +Then shutting the door impetuously, he flung himself upon a bench against +the wall, and bade Isabella sit by him. She obeyed trembling.<br> +<br> +“I sent for you, Lady,” said he - and then stopped under +great appearance of confusion.<br> +<br> +“My Lord!”<br> +<br> +“Yes, I sent for you on a matter of great moment,” resumed +he. “Dry your tears, young Lady - you have lost your bridegroom. +Yes, cruel fate! and I have lost the hopes of my race! But Conrad +was not worthy of your beauty.”<br> +<br> +“How, my Lord!” said Isabella; “sure you do not suspect +me of not feeling the concern I ought: my duty and affection would have +always - ”<br> +<br> +“Think no more of him,” interrupted Manfred; “he was +a sickly, puny child, and Heaven has perhaps taken him away, that I +might not trust the honours of my house on so frail a foundation. +The line of Manfred calls for numerous supports. My foolish fondness +for that boy blinded the eyes of my prudence - but it is better as it +is. I hope, in a few years, to have reason to rejoice at the death +of Conrad.”<br> +<br> +Words cannot paint the astonishment of Isabella. At first she +apprehended that grief had disordered Manfred’s understanding. +Her next thought suggested that this strange discourse was designed +to ensnare her: she feared that Manfred had perceived her indifference +for his son: and in consequence of that idea she replied -<br> +<br> +“Good my Lord, do not doubt my tenderness: my heart would have +accompanied my hand. Conrad would have engrossed all my care; +and wherever fate shall dispose of me, I shall always cherish his memory, +and regard your Highness and the virtuous Hippolita as my parents.”<br> +<br> +“Curse on Hippolita!” cried Manfred. “Forget +her from this moment, as I do. In short, Lady, you have missed +a husband undeserving of your charms: they shall now be better disposed +of. Instead of a sickly boy, you shall have a husband in the prime +of his age, who will know how to value your beauties, and who may expect +a numerous offspring.”<br> +<br> +“Alas, my Lord!” said Isabella, “my mind is too sadly +engrossed by the recent catastrophe in your family to think of another +marriage. If ever my father returns, and it shall be his pleasure, +I shall obey, as I did when I consented to give my hand to your son: +but until his return, permit me to remain under your hospitable roof, +and employ the melancholy hours in assuaging yours, Hippolita’s, +and the fair Matilda’s affliction.”<br> +<br> +“I desired you once before,” said Manfred angrily, “not +to name that woman: from this hour she must be a stranger to you, as +she must be to me. In short, Isabella, since I cannot give you +my son, I offer you myself.”<br> +<br> +“Heavens!” cried Isabella, waking from her delusion, “what +do I hear? You! my Lord! You! My father-in-law! the +father of Conrad! the husband of the virtuous and tender Hippolita!”<br> +<br> +“I tell you,” said Manfred imperiously, “Hippolita +is no longer my wife; I divorce her from this hour. Too long has +she cursed me by her unfruitfulness. My fate depends on having +sons, and this night I trust will give a new date to my hopes.”<br> +<br> +At those words he seized the cold hand of Isabella, who was half dead +with fright and horror. She shrieked, and started from him, Manfred +rose to pursue her, when the moon, which was now up, and gleamed in +at the opposite casement, presented to his sight the plumes of the fatal +helmet, which rose to the height of the windows, waving backwards and +forwards in a tempestuous manner, and accompanied with a hollow and +rustling sound. Isabella, who gathered courage from her situation, +and who dreaded nothing so much as Manfred’s pursuit of his declaration, +cried -<br> +<br> +“Look, my Lord! see, Heaven itself declares against your impious +intentions!”<br> +<br> +“Heaven nor Hell shall impede my designs,” said Manfred, +advancing again to seize the Princess.<br> +<br> +At that instant the portrait of his grandfather, which hung over the +bench where they had been sitting, uttered a deep sigh, and heaved its +breast.<br> +<br> +Isabella, whose back was turned to the picture, saw not the motion, +nor knew whence the sound came, but started, and said -<br> +<br> +“Hark, my Lord! What sound was that?” and at the same +time made towards the door.<br> +<br> +Manfred, distracted between the flight of Isabella, who had now reached +the stairs, and yet unable to keep his eyes from the picture, which +began to move, had, however, advanced some steps after her, still looking +backwards on the portrait, when he saw it quit its panel, and descend +on the floor with a grave and melancholy air.<br> +<br> +“Do I dream?” cried Manfred, returning; “or are the +devils themselves in league against me? Speak, internal spectre! +Or, if thou art my grandsire, why dost thou too conspire against thy +wretched descendant, who too dearly pays for - ” Ere he +could finish the sentence, the vision sighed again, and made a sign +to Manfred to follow him.<br> +<br> +“Lead on!” cried Manfred; “I will follow thee to the +gulf of perdition.”<br> +<br> +The spectre marched sedately, but dejected, to the end of the gallery, +and turned into a chamber on the right hand. Manfred accompanied +him at a little distance, full of anxiety and horror, but resolved. +As he would have entered the chamber, the door was clapped to with violence +by an invisible hand. The Prince, collecting courage from this +delay, would have forcibly burst open the door with his foot, but found +that it resisted his utmost efforts.<br> +<br> +“Since Hell will not satisfy my curiosity,” said Manfred, +“I will use the human means in my power for preserving my race; +Isabella shall not escape me.”<br> +<br> +The lady, whose resolution had given way to terror the moment she had +quitted Manfred, continued her flight to the bottom of the principal +staircase. There she stopped, not knowing whither to direct her +steps, nor how to escape from the impetuosity of the Prince. The +gates of the castle, she knew, were locked, and guards placed in the +court. Should she, as her heart prompted her, go and prepare Hippolita +for the cruel destiny that awaited her, she did not doubt but Manfred +would seek her there, and that his violence would incite him to double +the injury he meditated, without leaving room for them to avoid the +impetuosity of his passions. Delay might give him time to reflect +on the horrid measures he had conceived, or produce some circumstance +in her favour, if she could - for that night, at least - avoid his odious +purpose. Yet where conceal herself? How avoid the pursuit +he would infallibly make throughout the castle?<br> +<br> +As these thoughts passed rapidly through her mind, she recollected a +subterraneous passage which led from the vaults of the castle to the +church of St. Nicholas. Could she reach the altar before she was +overtaken, she knew even Manfred’s violence would not dare to +profane the sacredness of the place; and she determined, if no other +means of deliverance offered, to shut herself up for ever among the +holy virgins whose convent was contiguous to the cathedral. In +this resolution, she seized a lamp that burned at the foot of the staircase, +and hurried towards the secret passage.<br> +<br> +The lower part of the castle was hollowed into several intricate cloisters; +and it was not easy for one under so much anxiety to find the door that +opened into the cavern. An awful silence reigned throughout those +subterraneous regions, except now and then some blasts of wind that +shook the doors she had passed, and which, grating on the rusty hinges, +were re-echoed through that long labyrinth of darkness. Every +murmur struck her with new terror; yet more she dreaded to hear the +wrathful voice of Manfred urging his domestics to pursue her.<br> +<br> +She trod as softly as impatience would give her leave, yet frequently +stopped and listened to hear if she was followed. In one of those +moments she thought she heard a sigh. She shuddered, and recoiled +a few paces. In a moment she thought she heard the step of some +person. Her blood curdled; she concluded it was Manfred. +Every suggestion that horror could inspire rushed into her mind. +She condemned her rash flight, which had thus exposed her to his rage +in a place where her cries were not likely to draw anybody to her assistance. +Yet the sound seemed not to come from behind. If Manfred knew +where she was, he must have followed her. She was still in one +of the cloisters, and the steps she had heard were too distinct to proceed +from the way she had come. Cheered with this reflection, and hoping +to find a friend in whoever was not the Prince, she was going to advance, +when a door that stood ajar, at some distance to the left, was opened +gently: but ere her lamp, which she held up, could discover who opened +it, the person retreated precipitately on seeing the light.<br> +<br> +Isabella, whom every incident was sufficient to dismay, hesitated whether +she should proceed. Her dread of Manfred soon outweighed every +other terror. The very circumstance of the person avoiding her +gave her a sort of courage. It could only be, she thought, some +domestic belonging to the castle. Her gentleness had never raised +her an enemy, and conscious innocence made her hope that, unless sent +by the Prince’s order to seek her, his servants would rather assist +than prevent her flight. Fortifying herself with these reflections, +and believing by what she could observe that she was near the mouth +of the subterraneous cavern, she approached the door that had been opened; +but a sudden gust of wind that met her at the door extinguished her +lamp, and left her in total darkness.<br> +<br> +Words cannot paint the horror of the Princess’s situation. +Alone in so dismal a place, her mind imprinted with all the terrible +events of the day, hopeless of escaping, expecting every moment the +arrival of Manfred, and far from tranquil on knowing she was within +reach of somebody, she knew not whom, who for some cause seemed concealed +thereabouts; all these thoughts crowded on her distracted mind, and +she was ready to sink under her apprehensions. She addressed herself +to every saint in heaven, and inwardly implored their assistance. +For a considerable time she remained in an agony of despair.<br> +<br> +At last, as softly as was possible, she felt for the door, and having +found it, entered trembling into the vault from whence she had heard +the sigh and steps. It gave her a kind of momentary joy to perceive +an imperfect ray of clouded moonshine gleam from the roof of the vault, +which seemed to be fallen in, and from whence hung a fragment of earth +or building, she could not distinguish which, that appeared to have +been crushed inwards. She advanced eagerly towards this chasm, +when she discerned a human form standing close against the wall.<br> +<br> +She shrieked, believing it the ghost of her betrothed Conrad. +The figure, advancing, said, in a submissive voice -<br> +<br> +“Be not alarmed, Lady; I will not injure you.”<br> +<br> +Isabella, a little encouraged by the words and tone of voice of the +stranger, and recollecting that this must be the person who had opened +the door, recovered her spirits enough to reply -<br> +<br> +“Sir, whoever you are, take pity on a wretched Princess, standing +on the brink of destruction. Assist me to escape from this fatal +castle, or in a few moments I may be made miserable for ever.”<br> +<br> +“Alas!” said the stranger, “what can I do to assist +you? I will die in your defence; but I am unacquainted with the +castle, and want - ”<br> +<br> +“Oh!” said Isabella, hastily interrupting him; “help +me but to find a trap-door that must be hereabout, and it is the greatest +service you can do me, for I have not a minute to lose.”<br> +<br> +Saying a these words, she felt about on the pavement, and directed the +stranger to search likewise, for a smooth piece of brass enclosed in +one of the stones.<br> +<br> +“That,” said she, “is the lock, which opens with a +spring, of which I know the secret. If we can find that, I may +escape - if not, alas! courteous stranger, I fear I shall have involved +you in my misfortunes: Manfred will suspect you for the accomplice of +my flight, and you will fall a victim to his resentment.”<br> +<br> +“I value not my life,” said the stranger, “and it +will be some comfort to lose it in trying to deliver you from his tyranny.”<br> +<br> +“Generous youth,” said Isabella, “how shall I ever +requite - ”<br> +<br> +As she uttered those words, a ray of moonshine, streaming through a +cranny of the ruin above, shone directly on the lock they sought.<br> +<br> +“Oh! transport!” said Isabella; “here is the trap-door!” +and, taking out the key, she touched the spring, which, starting aside, +discovered an iron ring. “Lift up the door,” said +the Princess.<br> +<br> +The stranger obeyed, and beneath appeared some stone steps descending +into a vault totally dark.<br> +<br> +“We must go down here,” said Isabella. “Follow +me; dark and dismal as it is, we cannot miss our way; it leads directly +to the church of St. Nicholas. But, perhaps,” added the +Princess modestly, “you have no reason to leave the castle, nor +have I farther occasion for your service; in a few minutes I shall be +safe from Manfred’s rage - only let me know to whom I am so much +obliged.”<br> +<br> +“I will never quit you,” said the stranger eagerly, “until +I have placed you in safety - nor think me, Princess, more generous +than I am; though you are my principal care - ”<br> +<br> +The stranger was interrupted by a sudden noise of voices that seemed +approaching, and they soon distinguished these words -<br> +<br> +“Talk not to me of necromancers; I tell you she must be in the +castle; I will find her in spite of enchantment.”<br> +<br> +“Oh, heavens!” cried Isabella; “it is the voice of +Manfred! Make haste, or we are ruined! and shut the trap-door +after you.”<br> +<br> +Saying this, she descended the steps precipitately; and as the stranger +hastened to follow her, he let the door slip out of his hands: it fell, +and the spring closed over it. He tried in vain to open it, not +having observed Isabella’s method of touching the spring; nor +had he many moments to make an essay. The noise of the falling +door had been heard by Manfred, who, directed by the sound, hastened +thither, attended by his servants with torches.<br> +<br> +“It must be Isabella,” cried Manfred, before he entered +the vault. “She is escaping by the subterraneous passage, +but she cannot have got far.”<br> +<br> +What was the astonishment of the Prince when, instead of Isabella, the +light of the torches discovered to him the young peasant whom he thought +confined under the fatal helmet!<br> +<br> +“Traitor!” said Manfred; “how camest thou here? +I thought thee in durance above in the court.”<br> +<br> +“I am no traitor,” replied the young man boldly, “nor +am I answerable for your thoughts.”<br> +<br> +“Presumptuous villain!” cried Manfred; “dost thou +provoke my wrath? Tell me, how hast thou escaped from above? +Thou hast corrupted thy guards, and their lives shall answer it.”<br> +<br> +“My poverty,” said the peasant calmly, “will disculpate +them: though the ministers of a tyrant’s wrath, to thee they are +faithful, and but too willing to execute the orders which you unjustly +imposed upon them.”<br> +<br> +“Art thou so hardy as to dare my vengeance?” said the Prince; +“but tortures shall force the truth from thee. Tell me; +I will know thy accomplices.”<br> +<br> +“There was my accomplice!” said the youth, smiling, and +pointing to the roof.<br> +<br> +Manfred ordered the torches to be held up, and perceived that one of +the cheeks of the enchanted casque had forced its way through the pavement +of the court, as his servants had let it fall over the peasant, and +had broken through into the vault, leaving a gap, through which the +peasant had pressed himself some minutes before he was found by Isabella.<br> +<br> +“Was that the way by which thou didst descend?” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“It was,” said the youth.<br> +<br> +“But what noise was that,” said Manfred, “which I +heard as I entered the cloister?”<br> +<br> +“A door clapped,” said the peasant; “I heard it as +well as you.”<br> +<br> +“What door?” said Manfred hastily.<br> +<br> +“I am not acquainted with your castle,” said the peasant; +“this is the first time I ever entered it, and this vault the +only part of it within which I ever was.”<br> +<br> +“But I tell thee,” said Manfred (wishing to find out if +the youth had discovered the trap-door), “it was this way I heard +the noise. My servants heard it too.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” interrupted one of them officiously, “to +be sure it was the trap-door, and he was going to make his escape.”<br> +<br> +“Peace, blockhead!” said the Prince angrily; “if he +was going to escape, how should he come on this side? I will know +from his own mouth what noise it was I heard. Tell me truly; thy +life depends on thy veracity.”<br> +<br> +“My veracity is dearer to me than my life,” said the peasant; +“nor would I purchase the one by forfeiting the other.”<br> +<br> +“Indeed, young philosopher!” said Manfred contemptuously; +“tell me, then, what was the noise I heard?”<br> +<br> +“Ask me what I can answer,” said he, “and put me to +death instantly if I tell you a lie.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, growing impatient at the steady valour and indifference of +the youth, cried -<br> +<br> +“Well, then, thou man of truth, answer! Was it the fall +of the trap-door that I heard?”<br> +<br> +“It was,” said the youth.<br> +<br> +“It was!” said the Prince; “and how didst thou come +to know there was a trap-door here?”<br> +<br> +“I saw the plate of brass by a gleam of moonshine,” replied +he.<br> +<br> +“But what told thee it was a lock?” said Manfred. +“How didst thou discover the secret of opening it?”<br> +<br> +“Providence, that delivered me from the helmet, was able to direct +me to the spring of a lock,” said he.<br> +<br> +“Providence should have gone a little farther, and have placed +thee out of the reach of my resentment,” said Manfred. “When +Providence had taught thee to open the lock, it abandoned thee for a +fool, who did not know how to make use of its favours. Why didst +thou not pursue the path pointed out for thy escape? Why didst +thou shut the trap-door before thou hadst descended the steps?”<br> +<br> +“I might ask you, my Lord,” said the peasant, “how +I, totally unacquainted with your castle, was to know that those steps +led to any outlet? but I scorn to evade your questions. Wherever +those steps lead to, perhaps I should have explored the way - I could +not be in a worse situation than I was. But the truth is, I let +the trap-door fall: your immediate arrival followed. I had given +the alarm - what imported it to me whether I was seized a minute sooner +or a minute later?”<br> +<br> +“Thou art a resolute villain for thy years,” said Manfred; +“yet on reflection I suspect thou dost but trifle with me. +Thou hast not yet told me how thou didst open the lock.”<br> +<br> +“That I will show you, my Lord,” said the peasant; and, +taking up a fragment of stone that had fallen from above, he laid himself +on the trap-door, and began to beat on the piece of brass that covered +it, meaning to gain time for the escape of the Princess. This +presence of mind, joined to the frankness of the youth, staggered Manfred. +He even felt a disposition towards pardoning one who had been guilty +of no crime. Manfred was not one of those savage tyrants who wanton +in cruelty unprovoked. The circumstances of his fortune had given +an asperity to his temper, which was naturally humane; and his virtues +were always ready to operate, when his passions did not obscure his +reason.<br> +<br> +While the Prince was in this suspense, a confused noise of voices echoed +through the distant vaults. As the sound approached, he distinguished +the clamours of some of his domestics, whom he had dispersed through +the castle in search of Isabella, calling out -<br> +<br> +“Where is my Lord? where is the Prince?”<br> +<br> +“Here I am,” said Manfred, as they came nearer; “have +you found the Princess?”<br> +<br> +The first that arrived, replied, “Oh, my Lord! I am glad +we have found you.”<br> +<br> +“Found me!” said Manfred; “have you found the Princess?”<br> +<br> +“We thought we had, my Lord,” said the fellow, looking terrified, +“but - ”<br> +<br> +“But, what?” cried the Prince; “has she escaped?”<br> +<br> +“Jaquez and I, my Lord - ”<br> +<br> +“Yes, I and Diego,” interrupted the second, who came up +in still greater consternation.<br> +<br> +“Speak one of you at a time,” said Manfred; “I ask +you, where is the Princess?”<br> +<br> +“We do not know,” said they both together; “but we +are frightened out of our wits.”<br> +<br> +“So I think, blockheads,” said Manfred; “what is it +has scared you thus?”<br> +<br> +“Oh! my Lord,” said Jaquez, “Diego has seen such a +sight! your Highness would not believe our eyes.”<br> +<br> +“What new absurdity is this?” cried Manfred; “give +me a direct answer, or, by Heaven - ”<br> +<br> +“Why, my Lord, if it please your Highness to hear me,” said +the poor fellow, “Diego and I - ”<br> +<br> +“Yes, I and Jaquez - ” cried his comrade.<br> +<br> +“Did not I forbid you to speak both at a time?” said the +Prince: “you, Jaquez, answer; for the other fool seems more distracted +than thou art; what is the matter?”<br> +<br> +“My gracious Lord,” said Jaquez, “if it please your +Highness to hear me; Diego and I, according to your Highness’s +orders, went to search for the young Lady; but being comprehensive that +we might meet the ghost of my young Lord, your Highness’s son, +God rest his soul, as he has not received Christian burial - ”<br> +<br> +“Sot!” cried Manfred in a rage; “is it only a ghost, +then, that thou hast seen?”<br> +<br> +“Oh! worse! worse! my Lord,” cried Diego: “I had rather +have seen ten whole ghosts.”<br> +<br> +“Grant me patience!” said Manfred; “these blockheads +distract me. Out of my sight, Diego! and thou, Jaquez, tell me +in one word, art thou sober? art thou raving? thou wast wont to have +some sense: has the other sot frightened himself and thee too? +Speak; what is it he fancies he has seen?”<br> +<br> +“Why, my Lord,” replied Jaquez, trembling, “I was +going to tell your Highness, that since the calamitous misfortune of +my young Lord, God rest his precious soul! not one of us your Highness’s +faithful servants - indeed we are, my Lord, though poor men - I say, +not one of us has dared to set a foot about the castle, but two together: +so Diego and I, thinking that my young Lady might be in the great gallery, +went up there to look for her, and tell her your Highness wanted something +to impart to her.”<br> +<br> +“O blundering fools!” cried Manfred; “and in the meantime, +she has made her escape, because you were afraid of goblins! - Why, +thou knave! she left me in the gallery; I came from thence myself.”<br> +<br> +“For all that, she may be there still for aught I know,” +said Jaquez; “but the devil shall have me before I seek her there +again - poor Diego! I do not believe he will ever recover it.”<br> +<br> +“Recover what?” said Manfred; “am I never to learn +what it is has terrified these rascals? - but I lose my time; follow +me, slave; I will see if she is in the gallery.”<br> +<br> +“For Heaven’s sake, my dear, good Lord,” cried Jaquez, +“do not go to the gallery. Satan himself I believe is in +the chamber next to the gallery.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, who hitherto had treated the terror of his servants as an idle +panic, was struck at this new circumstance. He recollected the +apparition of the portrait, and the sudden closing of the door at the +end of the gallery. His voice faltered, and he asked with disorder +-<br> +<br> +“What is in the great chamber?”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said Jaquez, “when Diego and I came into +the gallery, he went first, for he said he had more courage than I. +So when we came into the gallery we found nobody. We looked under +every bench and stool; and still we found nobody.”<br> +<br> +“Were all the pictures in their places?” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“Yes, my Lord,” answered Jaquez; “but we did not think +of looking behind them.”<br> +<br> +“Well, well!” said Manfred; “proceed.”<br> +<br> +“When we came to the door of the great chamber,” continued +Jaquez, “we found it shut.”<br> +<br> +“And could not you open it?” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“Oh! yes, my Lord; would to Heaven we had not!” replied +he - “nay, it was not I neither; it was Diego: he was grown foolhardy, +and would go on, though I advised him not - if ever I open a door that +is shut again - ”<br> +<br> +“Trifle not,” said Manfred, shuddering, “but tell +me what you saw in the great chamber on opening the door.”<br> +<br> +“I! my Lord!” said Jaquez; “I was behind Diego; but +I heard the noise.”<br> +<br> +“Jaquez,” said Manfred, in a solemn tone of voice; “tell +me, I adjure thee by the souls of my ancestors, what was it thou sawest? +what was it thou heardest?”<br> +<br> +“It was Diego saw it, my Lord, it was not I,” replied Jaquez; +“I only heard the noise. Diego had no sooner opened the +door, than he cried out, and ran back. I ran back too, and said, +‘Is it the ghost?’ ‘The ghost! no, no,’ +said Diego, and his hair stood on end - ‘it is a giant, I believe; +he is all clad in armour, for I saw his foot and part of his leg, and +they are as large as the helmet below in the court.’ As +he said these words, my Lord, we heard a violent motion and the rattling +of armour, as if the giant was rising, for Diego has told me since that +he believes the giant was lying down, for the foot and leg were stretched +at length on the floor. Before we could get to the end of the +gallery, we heard the door of the great chamber clap behind us, but +we did not dare turn back to see if the giant was following us - yet, +now I think on it, we must have heard him if he had pursued us - but +for Heaven’s sake, good my Lord, send for the chaplain, and have +the castle exorcised, for, for certain, it is enchanted.”<br> +<br> +“Ay, pray do, my Lord,” cried all the servants at once, +“or we must leave your Highness’s service.”<br> +<br> +“Peace, dotards!” said Manfred, “and follow me; I +will know what all this means.”<br> +<br> +“We! my Lord!” cried they with one voice; “we would +not go up to the gallery for your Highness’s revenue.” +The young peasant, who had stood silent, now spoke.<br> +<br> +“Will your Highness,” said he, “permit me to try this +adventure? My life is of consequence to nobody; I fear no bad +angel, and have offended no good one.”<br> +<br> +“Your behaviour is above your seeming,” said Manfred, viewing +him with surprise and admiration - “hereafter I will reward your +bravery - but now,” continued he with a sigh, “I am so circumstanced, +that I dare trust no eyes but my own. However, I give you leave +to accompany me.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, when he first followed Isabella from the gallery, had gone +directly to the apartment of his wife, concluding the Princess had retired +thither. Hippolita, who knew his step, rose with anxious fondness +to meet her Lord, whom she had not seen since the death of their son. +She would have flown in a transport mixed of joy and grief to his bosom, +but he pushed her rudely off, and said -<br> +<br> +“Where is Isabella?”<br> +<br> +“Isabella! my Lord!” said the astonished Hippolita.<br> +<br> +“Yes, Isabella,” cried Manfred imperiously; “I want +Isabella.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” replied Matilda, who perceived how much his behaviour +had shocked her mother, “she has not been with us since your Highness +summoned her to your apartment.”<br> +<br> +“Tell me where she is,” said the Prince; “I do not +want to know where she has been.”<br> +<br> +“My good Lord,” says Hippolita, “your daughter tells +you the truth: Isabella left us by your command, and has not returned +since; - but, my good Lord, compose yourself: retire to your rest: this +dismal day has disordered you. Isabella shall wait your orders +in the morning.”<br> +<br> +“What, then, you know where she is!” cried Manfred. +“Tell me directly, for I will not lose an instant - and you, woman,” +speaking to his wife, “order your chaplain to attend me forthwith.”<br> +<br> +“Isabella,” said Hippolita calmly, “is retired, I +suppose, to her chamber: she is not accustomed to watch at this late +hour. Gracious my Lord,” continued she, “let me know +what has disturbed you. Has Isabella offended you?”<br> +<br> +“Trouble me not with questions,” said Manfred, “but +tell me where she is.”<br> +<br> +“Matilda shall call her,” said the Princess. “Sit +down, my Lord, and resume your wonted fortitude.”<br> +<br> +“What, art thou jealous of Isabella?” replied he, “that +you wish to be present at our interview!”<br> +<br> +“Good heavens! my Lord,” said Hippolita, “what is +it your Highness means?”<br> +<br> +“Thou wilt know ere many minutes are passed,” said the cruel +Prince. “Send your chaplain to me, and wait my pleasure +here.”<br> +<br> +At these words he flung out of the room in search of Isabella, leaving +the amazed ladies thunderstruck with his words and frantic deportment, +and lost in vain conjectures on what he was meditating.<br> +<br> +Manfred was now returning from the vault, attended by the peasant and +a few of his servants whom he had obliged to accompany him. He +ascended the staircase without stopping till he arrived at the gallery, +at the door of which he met Hippolita and her chaplain. When Diego +had been dismissed by Manfred, he had gone directly to the Princess’s +apartment with the alarm of what he had seen. That excellent Lady, +who no more than Manfred doubted of the reality of the vision, yet affected +to treat it as a delirium of the servant. Willing, however, to +save her Lord from any additional shock, and prepared by a series of +griefs not to tremble at any accession to it, she determined to make +herself the first sacrifice, if fate had marked the present hour for +their destruction. Dismissing the reluctant Matilda to her rest, +who in vain sued for leave to accompany her mother, and attended only +by her chaplain, Hippolita had visited the gallery and great chamber; +and now with more serenity of soul than she had felt for many hours, +she met her Lord, and assured him that the vision of the gigantic leg +and foot was all a fable; and no doubt an impression made by fear, and +the dark and dismal hour of the night, on the minds of his servants. +She and the chaplain had examined the chamber, and found everything +in the usual order.<br> +<br> +Manfred, though persuaded, like his wife, that the vision had been no +work of fancy, recovered a little from the tempest of mind into which +so many strange events had thrown him. Ashamed, too, of his inhuman +treatment of a Princess who returned every injury with new marks of +tenderness and duty, he felt returning love forcing itself into his +eyes; but not less ashamed of feeling remorse towards one against whom +he was inwardly meditating a yet more bitter outrage, he curbed the +yearnings of his heart, and did not dare to lean even towards pity. +The next transition of his soul was to exquisite villainy.<br> +<br> +Presuming on the unshaken submission of Hippolita, he flattered himself +that she would not only acquiesce with patience to a divorce, but would +obey, if it was his pleasure, in endeavouring to persuade Isabella to +give him her hand - but ere he could indulge his horrid hope, he reflected +that Isabella was not to be found. Coming to himself, he gave +orders that every avenue to the castle should be strictly guarded, and +charged his domestics on pain of their lives to suffer nobody to pass +out. The young peasant, to whom he spoke favourably, he ordered +to remain in a small chamber on the stairs, in which there was a pallet-bed, +and the key of which he took away himself, telling the youth he would +talk with him in the morning. Then dismissing his attendants, +and bestowing a sullen kind of half-nod on Hippolita, he retired to +his own chamber.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +CHAPTER II.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Matilda, who by Hippolita’s order had retired to her apartment, +was ill-disposed to take any rest. The shocking fate of her brother +had deeply affected her. She was surprised at not seeing Isabella; +but the strange words which had fallen from her father, and his obscure +menace to the Princess his wife, accompanied by the most furious behaviour, +had filled her gentle mind with terror and alarm. She waited anxiously +for the return of Bianca, a young damsel that attended her, whom she +had sent to learn what was become of Isabella. Bianca soon appeared, +and informed her mistress of what she had gathered from the servants, +that Isabella was nowhere to be found. She related the adventure +of the young peasant who had been discovered in the vault, though with +many simple additions from the incoherent accounts of the domestics; +and she dwelt principally on the gigantic leg and foot which had been +seen in the gallery-chamber. This last circumstance had terrified +Bianca so much, that she was rejoiced when Matilda told her that she +would not go to rest, but would watch till the Princess should rise.<br> +<br> +The young Princess wearied herself in conjectures on the flight of Isabella, +and on the threats of Manfred to her mother. “But what business +could he have so urgent with the chaplain?” said Matilda, “Does +he intend to have my brother’s body interred privately in the +chapel?”<br> +<br> +“Oh, Madam!” said Bianca, “now I guess. As you +are become his heiress, he is impatient to have you married: he has +always been raving for more sons; I warrant he is now impatient for +grandsons. As sure as I live, Madam, I shall see you a bride at +last. - Good madam, you won’t cast off your faithful Bianca: you +won’t put Donna Rosara over me now you are a great Princess.”<br> +<br> +“My poor Bianca,” said Matilda, “how fast your thoughts +amble! I a great princess! What hast thou seen in Manfred’s +behaviour since my brother’s death that bespeaks any increase +of tenderness to me? No, Bianca; his heart was ever a stranger +to me - but he is my father, and I must not complain. Nay, if +Heaven shuts my father’s heart against me, it overpays my little +merit in the tenderness of my mother - O that dear mother! yes, Bianca, +’tis there I feel the rugged temper of Manfred. I can support +his harshness to me with patience; but it wounds my soul when I am witness +to his causeless severity towards her.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! Madam,” said Bianca, “all men use their wives +so, when they are weary of them.”<br> +<br> +“And yet you congratulated me but now,” said Matilda, “when +you fancied my father intended to dispose of me!”<br> +<br> +“I would have you a great Lady,” replied Bianca, “come +what will. I do not wish to see you moped in a convent, as you +would be if you had your will, and if my Lady, your mother, who knows +that a bad husband is better than no husband at all, did not hinder +you. - Bless me! what noise is that! St. Nicholas forgive me! +I was but in jest.”<br> +<br> +“It is the wind,” said Matilda, “whistling through +the battlements in the tower above: you have heard it a thousand times.”<br> +<br> +“Nay,” said Bianca, “there was no harm neither in +what I said: it is no sin to talk of matrimony - and so, Madam, as I +was saying, if my Lord Manfred should offer you a handsome young Prince +for a bridegroom, you would drop him a curtsey, and tell him you would +rather take the veil?”<br> +<br> +“Thank Heaven! I am in no such danger,” said Matilda: +“you know how many proposals for me he has rejected - ”<br> +<br> +“And you thank him, like a dutiful daughter, do you, Madam? +But come, Madam; suppose, to-morrow morning, he was to send for you +to the great council chamber, and there you should find at his elbow +a lovely young Prince, with large black eyes, a smooth white forehead, +and manly curling locks like jet; in short, Madam, a young hero resembling +the picture of the good Alfonso in the gallery, which you sit and gaze +at for hours together - ”<br> +<br> +“Do not speak lightly of that picture,” interrupted Matilda +sighing; “I know the adoration with which I look at that picture +is uncommon - but I am not in love with a coloured panel. The +character of that virtuous Prince, the veneration with which my mother +has inspired me for his memory, the orisons which, I know not why, she +has enjoined me to pour forth at his tomb, all have concurred to persuade +me that somehow or other my destiny is linked with something relating +to him.”<br> +<br> +“Lord, Madam! how should that be?” said Bianca; “I +have always heard that your family was in no way related to his: and +I am sure I cannot conceive why my Lady, the Princess, sends you in +a cold morning or a damp evening to pray at his tomb: he is no saint +by the almanack. If you must pray, why does she not bid you address +yourself to our great St. Nicholas? I am sure he is the saint +I pray to for a husband.”<br> +<br> +“Perhaps my mind would be less affected,” said Matilda, +“if my mother would explain her reasons to me: but it is the mystery +she observes, that inspires me with this - I know not what to call it. +As she never acts from caprice, I am sure there is some fatal secret +at bottom - nay, I know there is: in her agony of grief for my brother’s +death she dropped some words that intimated as much.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! dear Madam,” cried Bianca, “what were they?”<br> +<br> +“No,” said Matilda, “if a parent lets fall a word, +and wishes it recalled, it is not for a child to utter it.”<br> +<br> +“What! was she sorry for what she had said?” asked Bianca; +“I am sure, Madam, you may trust me - ”<br> +<br> +“With my own little secrets when I have any, I may,” said +Matilda; “but never with my mother’s: a child ought to have +no ears or eyes but as a parent directs.”<br> +<br> +“Well! to be sure, Madam, you were born to be a saint,” +said Bianca, “and there is no resisting one’s vocation: +you will end in a convent at last. But there is my Lady Isabella +would not be so reserved to me: she will let me talk to her of young +men: and when a handsome cavalier has come to the castle, she has owned +to me that she wished your brother Conrad resembled him.”<br> +<br> +“Bianca,” said the Princess, “I do not allow you to +mention my friend disrespectfully. Isabella is of a cheerful disposition, +but her soul is pure as virtue itself. She knows your idle babbling +humour, and perhaps has now and then encouraged it, to divert melancholy, +and enliven the solitude in which my father keeps us - ”<br> +<br> +“Blessed Mary!” said Bianca, starting, “there it is +again! Dear Madam, do you hear nothing? this castle is certainly +haunted!”<br> +<br> +“Peace!” said Matilda, “and listen! I did think +I heard a voice - but it must be fancy: your terrors, I suppose, have +infected me.”<br> +<br> +“Indeed! indeed! Madam,” said Bianca, half-weeping +with agony, “I am sure I heard a voice.”<br> +<br> +“Does anybody lie in the chamber beneath?” said the Princess.<br> +<br> +“Nobody has dared to lie there,” answered Bianca, “since +the great astrologer, that was your brother’s tutor, drowned himself. +For certain, Madam, his ghost and the young Prince’s are now met +in the chamber below - for Heaven’s sake let us fly to your mother’s +apartment!”<br> +<br> +“I charge you not to stir,” said Matilda. “If +they are spirits in pain, we may ease their sufferings by questioning +them. They can mean no hurt to us, for we have not injured them +- and if they should, shall we be more safe in one chamber than in another? +Reach me my beads; we will say a prayer, and then speak to them.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! dear Lady, I would not speak to a ghost for the world!” +cried Bianca. As she said those words they heard the casement +of the little chamber below Matilda’s open. They listened +attentively, and in a few minutes thought they heard a person sing, +but could not distinguish the words.<br> +<br> +“This can be no evil spirit,” said the Princess, in a low +voice; “it is undoubtedly one of the family - open the window, +and we shall know the voice.”<br> +<br> +“I dare not, indeed, Madam,” said Bianca.<br> +<br> +“Thou art a very fool,” said Matilda, opening the window +gently herself. The noise the Princess made was, however, heard +by the person beneath, who stopped; and they concluded had heard the +casement open.<br> +<br> +“Is anybody below?” said the Princess; “if there is, +speak.”<br> +<br> +“Yes,” said an unknown voice.<br> +<br> +“Who is it?” said Matilda.<br> +<br> +“A stranger,” replied the voice.<br> +<br> +“What stranger?” said she; “and how didst thou come +there at this unusual hour, when all the gates of the castle are locked?”<br> +<br> +“I am not here willingly,” answered the voice. “But +pardon me, Lady, if I have disturbed your rest; I knew not that I was +overheard. Sleep had forsaken me; I left a restless couch, and +came to waste the irksome hours with gazing on the fair approach of +morning, impatient to be dismissed from this castle.”<br> +<br> +“Thy words and accents,” said Matilda, “are of melancholy +cast; if thou art unhappy, I pity thee. If poverty afflicts thee, +let me know it; I will mention thee to the Princess, whose beneficent +soul ever melts for the distressed, and she will relieve thee.”<br> +<br> +“I am indeed unhappy,” said the stranger; “and I know +not what wealth is. But I do not complain of the lot which Heaven +has cast for me; I am young and healthy, and am not ashamed of owing +my support to myself - yet think me not proud, or that I disdain your +generous offers. I will remember you in my orisons, and will pray +for blessings on your gracious self and your noble mistress - if I sigh, +Lady, it is for others, not for myself.”<br> +<br> +“Now I have it, Madam,” said Bianca, whispering the Princess; +“this is certainly the young peasant; and, by my conscience, he +is in love - Well! this is a charming adventure! - do, Madam, let us +sift him. He does not know you, but takes you for one of my Lady +Hippolita’s women.”<br> +<br> +“Art thou not ashamed, Bianca!” said the Princess. + “What right have we to pry into the secrets of this young man’s +heart? He seems virtuous and frank, and tells us he is unhappy. +Are those circumstances that authorise us to make a property of him? +How are we entitled to his confidence?”<br> +<br> +“Lord, Madam! how little you know of love!” replied Bianca; +“why, lovers have no pleasure equal to talking of their mistress.”<br> +<br> +“And would you have <i>me</i> become a peasant’s confidante?” +said the Princess.<br> +<br> +“Well, then, let me talk to him,” said Bianca; “though +I have the honour of being your Highness’s maid of honour, I was +not always so great. Besides, if love levels ranks, it raises +them too; I have a respect for any young man in love.”<br> +<br> +“Peace, simpleton!” said the Princess. “Though +he said he was unhappy, it does not follow that he must be in love. +Think of all that has happened to-day, and tell me if there are no misfortunes +but what love causes. - Stranger,” resumed the Princess, “if +thy misfortunes have not been occasioned by thy own fault, and are within +the compass of the Princess Hippolita’s power to redress, I will +take upon me to answer that she will be thy protectress. When +thou art dismissed from this castle, repair to holy father Jerome, at +the convent adjoining to the church of St. Nicholas, and make thy story +known to him, as far as thou thinkest meet. He will not fail to +inform the Princess, who is the mother of all that want her assistance. +Farewell; it is not seemly for me to hold farther converse with a man +at this unwonted hour.”<br> +<br> +“May the saints guard thee, gracious Lady!” replied the +peasant; “but oh! if a poor and worthless stranger might presume +to beg a minute’s audience farther; am I so happy? the casement +is not shut; might I venture to ask - ”<br> +<br> +“Speak quickly,” said Matilda; “the morning dawns +apace: should the labourers come into the fields and perceive us - What +wouldst thou ask?”<br> +<br> +“I know not how, I know not if I dare,” said the Young stranger, +faltering; “yet the humanity with which you have spoken to me +emboldens - Lady! dare I trust you?”<br> +<br> +“Heavens!” said Matilda, “what dost thou mean? +With what wouldst thou trust me? Speak boldly, if thy secret is +fit to be entrusted to a virtuous breast.”<br> +<br> +“I would ask,” said the peasant, recollecting himself, “whether +what I have heard from the domestics is true, that the Princess is missing +from the castle?”<br> +<br> +“What imports it to thee to know?” replied Matilda. +“Thy first words bespoke a prudent and becoming gravity. +Dost thou come hither to pry into the secrets of Manfred? Adieu. +I have been mistaken in thee.” Saying these words she shut +the casement hastily, without giving the young man time to reply.<br> +<br> +“I had acted more wisely,” said the Princess to Bianca, +with some sharpness, “if I had let thee converse with this peasant; +his inquisitiveness seems of a piece with thy own.”<br> +<br> +“It is not fit for me to argue with your Highness,” replied +Bianca; “but perhaps the questions I should have put to him would +have been more to the purpose than those you have been pleased to ask +him.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! no doubt,” said Matilda; “you are a very discreet +personage! May I know what <i>you</i> would have asked him?”<br> +<br> +“A bystander often sees more of the game than those that play,” +answered Bianca. “Does your Highness think, Madam, that +this question about my Lady Isabella was the result of mere curiosity? +No, no, Madam, there is more in it than you great folks are aware of. +Lopez told me that all the servants believe this young fellow contrived +my Lady Isabella’s escape; now, pray, Madam, observe you and I +both know that my Lady Isabella never much fancied the Prince your brother. +Well! he is killed just in a critical minute - I accuse nobody. +A helmet falls from the moon - so, my Lord, your father says; but Lopez +and all the servants say that this young spark is a magician, and stole +it from Alfonso’s tomb - ”<br> +<br> +“Have done with this rhapsody of impertinence,” said Matilda.<br> +<br> +“Nay, Madam, as you please,” cried Bianca; “yet it +is very particular though, that my Lady Isabella should be missing the +very same day, and that this young sorcerer should be found at the mouth +of the trap-door. I accuse nobody; but if my young Lord came honestly +by his death - ”<br> +<br> +“Dare not on thy duty,” said Matilda, “to breathe +a suspicion on the purity of my dear Isabella’s fame.”<br> +<br> +“Purity, or not purity,” said Bianca, “gone she is +- a stranger is found that nobody knows; you question him yourself; +he tells you he is in love, or unhappy, it is the same thing - nay, +he owned he was unhappy about others; and is anybody unhappy about another, +unless they are in love with them? and at the very next word, he asks +innocently, pour soul! if my Lady Isabella is missing.”<br> +<br> +“To be sure,” said Matilda, “thy observations are +not totally without foundation - Isabella’s flight amazes me. +The curiosity of the stranger is very particular; yet Isabella never +concealed a thought from me.”<br> +<br> +“So she told you,” said Bianca, “to fish out your +secrets; but who knows, Madam, but this stranger may be some Prince +in disguise? Do, Madam, let me open the window, and ask him a +few questions.”<br> +<br> +“No,” replied Matilda, “I will ask him myself, if +he knows aught of Isabella; he is not worthy I should converse farther +with him.” She was going to open the casement, when they +heard the bell ring at the postern-gate of the castle, which is on the +right hand of the tower, where Matilda lay. This prevented the +Princess from renewing the conversation with the stranger.<br> +<br> +After continuing silent for some time, “I am persuaded,” +said she to Bianca, “that whatever be the cause of Isabella’s +flight it had no unworthy motive. If this stranger was accessory +to it, she must be satisfied with his fidelity and worth. I observed, +did not you, Bianca? that his words were tinctured with an uncommon +infusion of piety. It was no ruffian’s speech; his phrases +were becoming a man of gentle birth.”<br> +<br> +“I told you, Madam,” said Bianca, “that I was sure +he was some Prince in disguise.”<br> +<br> +“Yet,” said Matilda, “if he was privy to her escape, +how will you account for his not accompanying her in her flight? why +expose himself unnecessarily and rashly to my father’s resentment?”<br> +<br> +“As for that, Madam,” replied she, “if he could get +from under the helmet, he will find ways of eluding your father’s +anger. I do not doubt but he has some talisman or other about +him.”<br> +<br> +“You resolve everything into magic,” said Matilda; “but +a man who has any intercourse with infernal spirits, does not dare to +make use of those tremendous and holy words which he uttered. +Didst thou not observe with what fervour he vowed to remember <i>me</i> +to heaven in his prayers? Yes; Isabella was undoubtedly convinced +of his piety.”<br> +<br> +“Commend me to the piety of a young fellow and a damsel that consult +to elope!” said Bianca. “No, no, Madam, my Lady Isabella +is of another guess mould than you take her for. She used indeed +to sigh and lift up her eyes in your company, because she knows you +are a saint; but when your back was turned - ”<br> +<br> +“You wrong her,” said Matilda; “Isabella is no hypocrite; +she has a due sense of devotion, but never affected a call she has not. +On the contrary, she always combated my inclination for the cloister; +and though I own the mystery she has made to me of her flight confounds +me; though it seems inconsistent with the friendship between us; I cannot +forget the disinterested warmth with which she always opposed my taking +the veil. She wished to see me married, though my dower would +have been a loss to her and my brother’s children. For her +sake I will believe well of this young peasant.”<br> +<br> +“Then you do think there is some liking between them,” said +Bianca. While she was speaking, a servant came hastily into the +chamber and told the Princess that the Lady Isabella was found.<br> +<br> +“Where?” said Matilda.<br> +<br> +“She has taken sanctuary in St. Nicholas’s church,” +replied the servant; “Father Jerome has brought the news himself; +he is below with his Highness.”<br> +<br> +“Where is my mother?” said Matilda.<br> +<br> +“She is in her own chamber, Madam, and has asked for you.”<br> +<br> +Manfred had risen at the first dawn of light, and gone to Hippolita’s +apartment, to inquire if she knew aught of Isabella. While he +was questioning her, word was brought that Jerome demanded to speak +with him. Manfred, little suspecting the cause of the Friar’s +arrival, and knowing he was employed by Hippolita in her charities, +ordered him to be admitted, intending to leave them together, while +he pursued his search after Isabella.<br> +<br> +“Is your business with me or the Princess?” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“With both,” replied the holy man. “The Lady +Isabella - ”<br> +<br> +“What of her?” interrupted Manfred, eagerly.<br> +<br> +“Is at St. Nicholas’s altar,” replied Jerome.<br> +<br> +“That is no business of Hippolita,” said Manfred with confusion; +“let us retire to my chamber, Father, and inform me how she came +thither.”<br> +<br> +“No, my Lord,” replied the good man, with an air of firmness +and authority, that daunted even the resolute Manfred, who could not +help revering the saint-like virtues of Jerome; “my commission +is to both, and with your Highness’s good-liking, in the presence +of both I shall deliver it; but first, my Lord, I must interrogate the +Princess, whether she is acquainted with the cause of the Lady Isabella’s +retirement from your castle.”<br> +<br> +“No, on my soul,” said Hippolita; “does Isabella charge +me with being privy to it?”<br> +<br> +“Father,” interrupted Manfred, “I pay due reverence +to your holy profession; but I am sovereign here, and will allow no +meddling priest to interfere in the affairs of my domestic. If +you have aught to say attend me to my chamber; I do not use to let my +wife be acquainted with the secret affairs of my state; they are not +within a woman’s province.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said the holy man, “I am no intruder into +the secrets of families. My office is to promote peace, to heal +divisions, to preach repentance, and teach mankind to curb their headstrong +passions. I forgive your Highness’s uncharitable apostrophe; +I know my duty, and am the minister of a mightier prince than Manfred. +Hearken to him who speaks through my organs.”<br> +<br> +Manfred trembled with rage and shame. Hippolita’s countenance +declared her astonishment and impatience to know where this would end. +Her silence more strongly spoke her observance of Manfred.<br> +<br> +“The Lady Isabella,” resumed Jerome, “commends herself +to both your Highnesses; she thanks both for the kindness with which +she has been treated in your castle: she deplores the loss of your son, +and her own misfortune in not becoming the daughter of such wise and +noble Princes, whom she shall always respect as Parents; she prays for +uninterrupted union and felicity between you” [Manfred’s +colour changed]: “but as it is no longer possible for her to be +allied to you, she entreats your consent to remain in sanctuary, till +she can learn news of her father, or, by the certainty of his death, +be at liberty, with the approbation of her guardians, to dispose of +herself in suitable marriage.”<br> +<br> +“I shall give no such consent,” said the Prince, “but +insist on her return to the castle without delay: I am answerable for +her person to her guardians, and will not brook her being in any hands +but my own.”<br> +<br> +“Your Highness will recollect whether that can any longer be proper,” +replied the Friar.<br> +<br> +“I want no monitor,” said Manfred, colouring; “Isabella’s +conduct leaves room for strange suspicions - and that young villain, +who was at least the accomplice of her flight, if not the cause of it +- ”<br> +<br> +“The cause!” interrupted Jerome; “was a <i>young</i> +man the cause?”<br> +<br> +“This is not to be borne!” cried Manfred. “Am +I to be bearded in my own palace by an insolent Monk? Thou art +privy, I guess, to their amours.”<br> +<br> +“I would pray to heaven to clear up your uncharitable surmises,” +said Jerome, “if your Highness were not satisfied in your conscience +how unjustly you accuse me. I do pray to heaven to pardon that +uncharitableness: and I implore your Highness to leave the Princess +at peace in that holy place, where she is not liable to be disturbed +by such vain and worldly fantasies as discourses of love from any man.”<br> +<br> +“Cant not to me,” said Manfred, “but return and bring +the Princess to her duty.”<br> +<br> +“It is my duty to prevent her return hither,” said Jerome. +“She is where orphans and virgins are safest from the snares and +wiles of this world; and nothing but a parent’s authority shall +take her thence.”<br> +<br> +“I am her parent,” cried Manfred, “and demand her.”<br> +<br> +“She wished to have you for her parent,” said the Friar; +“but Heaven that forbad that connection has for ever dissolved +all ties betwixt you: and I announce to your Highness - ”<br> +<br> +“Stop! audacious man,” said Manfred, “and dread my +displeasure.”<br> +<br> +“Holy farther,” said Hippolita, “it is your office +to be no respecter of persons: you must speak as your duty prescribes: +but it is my duty to hear nothing that it pleases not my Lord I should +hear. Attend the Prince to his chamber. I will retire to +my oratory, and pray to the blessed Virgin to inspire you with her holy +counsels, and to restore the heart of my gracious Lord to its wonted +peace and gentleness.”<br> +<br> +“Excellent woman!” said the Friar. “My Lord, +I attend your pleasure.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, accompanied by the Friar, passed to his own apartment, where +shutting the door, “I perceive, Father,” said he, “that +Isabella has acquainted you with my purpose. Now hear my resolve, +and obey. Reasons of state, most urgent reasons, my own and the +safety of my people, demand that I should have a son. It is in +vain to expect an heir from Hippolita. I have made choice of Isabella. +You must bring her back; and you must do more. I know the influence +you have with Hippolita: her conscience is in your hands. She +is, I allow, a faultless woman: her soul is set on heaven, and scorns +the little grandeur of this world: you can withdraw her from it entirely. +Persuade her to consent to the dissolution of our marriage, and to retire +into a monastery - she shall endow one if she will; and she shall have +the means of being as liberal to your order as she or you can wish. +Thus you will divert the calamities that are hanging over our heads, +and have the merit of saying the principality of Otranto from destruction. +You are a prudent man, and though the warmth of my temper betrayed me +into some unbecoming expressions, I honour your virtue, and wish to +be indebted to you for the repose of my life and the preservation of +my family.”<br> +<br> +“The will of heaven be done!” said the Friar. “I +am but its worthless instrument. It makes use of my tongue to +tell thee, Prince, of thy unwarrantable designs. The injuries +of the virtuous Hippolita have mounted to the throne of pity. +By me thou art reprimanded for thy adulterous intention of repudiating +her: by me thou art warned not to pursue the incestuous design on thy +contracted daughter. Heaven that delivered her from thy fury, +when the judgments so recently fallen on thy house ought to have inspired +thee with other thoughts, will continue to watch over her. Even +I, a poor and despised Friar, am able to protect her from thy violence +- I, sinner as I am, and uncharitably reviled by your Highness as an +accomplice of I know not what amours, scorn the allurements with which +it has pleased thee to tempt mine honesty. I love my order; I +honour devout souls; I respect the piety of thy Princess - but I will +not betray the confidence she reposes in me, nor serve even the cause +of religion by foul and sinful compliances - but forsooth! the welfare +of the state depends on your Highness having a son! Heaven mocks +the short-sighted views of man. But yester-morn, whose house was +so great, so flourishing as Manfred’s? - where is young Conrad +now? - My Lord, I respect your tears - but I mean not to check them +- let them flow, Prince! They will weigh more with heaven toward +the welfare of thy subjects, than a marriage, which, founded on lust +or policy, could never prosper. The sceptre, which passed from +the race of Alfonso to thine, cannot be preserved by a match which the +church will never allow. If it is the will of the Most High that +Manfred’s name must perish, resign yourself, my Lord, to its decrees; +and thus deserve a crown that can never pass away. Come, my Lord; +I like this sorrow - let us return to the Princess: she is not apprised +of your cruel intentions; nor did I mean more than to alarm you. +You saw with what gentle patience, with what efforts of love, she heard, +she rejected hearing, the extent of your guilt. I know she longs +to fold you in her arms, and assure you of her unalterable affection.”<br> +<br> +“Father,” said the Prince, “you mistake my compunction: +true, I honour Hippolita’s virtues; I think her a Saint; and wish +it were for my soul’s health to tie faster the knot that has united +us - but alas! Father, you know not the bitterest of my pangs! it is +some time that I have had scruples on the legality of our union: Hippolita +is related to me in the fourth degree - it is true, we had a dispensation: +but I have been informed that she had also been contracted to another. +This it is that sits heavy at my heart: to this state of unlawful wedlock +I impute the visitation that has fallen on me in the death of Conrad! +- ease my conscience of this burden: dissolve our marriage, and accomplish +the work of godliness - which your divine exhortations have commenced +in my soul.”<br> +<br> +How cutting was the anguish which the good man felt, when he perceived +this turn in the wily Prince! He trembled for Hippolita, whose +ruin he saw was determined; and he feared if Manfred had no hope of +recovering Isabella, that his impatience for a son would direct him +to some other object, who might not be equally proof against the temptation +of Manfred’s rank. For some time the holy man remained absorbed +in thought. At length, conceiving some hopes from delay, he thought +the wisest conduct would be to prevent the Prince from despairing of +recovering Isabella. Her the Friar knew he could dispose, from +her affection to Hippolita, and from the aversion she had expressed +to him for Manfred’s addresses, to second his views, till the +censures of the church could be fulminated against a divorce. +With this intention, as if struck with the Prince’s scruples, +he at length said:<br> +<br> +“My Lord, I have been pondering on what your Highness has said; +and if in truth it is delicacy of conscience that is the real motive +of your repugnance to your virtuous Lady, far be it from me to endeavour +to harden your heart. The church is an indulgent mother: unfold +your griefs to her: she alone can administer comfort to your soul, either +by satisfying your conscience, or upon examination of your scruples, +by setting you at liberty, and indulging you in the lawful means of +continuing your lineage. In the latter case, if the Lady Isabella +can be brought to consent - ”<br> +<br> +Manfred, who concluded that he had either over-reached the good man, +or that his first warmth had been but a tribute paid to appearance, +was overjoyed at this sudden turn, and repeated the most magnificent +promises, if he should succeed by the Friar’s mediation. +The well-meaning priest suffered him to deceive himself, fully determined +to traverse his views, instead of seconding them.<br> +<br> +“Since we now understand one another,” resumed the Prince, +“I expect, Father, that you satisfy me in one point. Who +is the youth that I found in the vault? He must have been privy +to Isabella’s flight: tell me truly, is he her lover? or is he +an agent for another’s passion? I have often suspected Isabella’s +indifference to my son: a thousand circumstances crowd on my mind that +confirm that suspicion. She herself was so conscious of it, that +while I discoursed her in the gallery, she outran my suspicious, and +endeavoured to justify herself from coolness to Conrad.”<br> +<br> +The Friar, who knew nothing of the youth, but what he had learnt occasionally +from the Princess, ignorant what was become of him, and not sufficiently +reflecting on the impetuosity of Manfred’s temper, conceived that +it might not be amiss to sow the seeds of jealousy in his mind: they +might be turned to some use hereafter, either by prejudicing the Prince +against Isabella, if he persisted in that union or by diverting his +attention to a wrong scent, and employing his thoughts on a visionary +intrigue, prevent his engaging in any new pursuit. With this unhappy +policy, he answered in a manner to confirm Manfred in the belief of +some connection between Isabella and the youth. The Prince, whose +passions wanted little fuel to throw them into a blaze, fell into a +rage at the idea of what the Friar suggested.<br> +<br> + “I will fathom to the bottom of this intrigue,” cried +he; and quitting Jerome abruptly, with a command to remain there till +his return, he hastened to the great hall of the castle, and ordered +the peasant to be brought before him.<br> +<br> +“Thou hardened young impostor!” said the Prince, as soon +as he saw the youth; “what becomes of thy boasted veracity now? +it was Providence, was it, and the light of the moon, that discovered +the lock of the trap-door to thee? Tell me, audacious boy, who +thou art, and how long thou hast been acquainted with the Princess - +and take care to answer with less equivocation than thou didst last +night, or tortures shall wring the truth from thee.”<br> +<br> +The young man, perceiving that his share in the flight of the Princess +was discovered, and concluding that anything he should say could no +longer be of any service or detriment to her, replied -<br> +<br> +“I am no impostor, my Lord, nor have I deserved opprobrious language. +I answered to every question your Highness put to me last night with +the same veracity that I shall speak now: and that will not be from +fear of your tortures, but because my soul abhors a falsehood. +Please to repeat your questions, my Lord; I am ready to give you all +the satisfaction in my power.”<br> +<br> +“You know my questions,” replied the Prince, “and +only want time to prepare an evasion. Speak directly; who art +thou? and how long hast thou been known to the Princess?”<br> +<br> +“I am a labourer at the next village,” said the peasant; +“my name is Theodore. The Princess found me in the vault +last night: before that hour I never was in her presence.”<br> +<br> +“I may believe as much or as little as I please of this,” +said Manfred; “but I will hear thy own story before I examine +into the truth of it. Tell me, what reason did the Princess give +thee for making her escape? thy life depends on thy answer.”<br> +<br> +“She told me,” replied Theodore, “that she was on +the brink of destruction, and that if she could not escape from the +castle, she was in danger in a few moments of being made miserable for +ever.”<br> +<br> +“And on this slight foundation, on a silly girl’s report,” +said Manfred, “thou didst hazard my displeasure?”<br> +<br> +“I fear no man’s displeasure,” said Theodore, “when +a woman in distress puts herself under my protection.”<br> +<br> +During this examination, Matilda was going to the apartment of Hippolita. +At the upper end of the hall, where Manfred sat, was a boarded gallery +with latticed windows, through which Matilda and Bianca were to pass. +Hearing her father’s voice, and seeing the servants assembled +round him, she stopped to learn the occasion. The prisoner soon +drew her attention: the steady and composed manner in which he answered, +and the gallantry of his last reply, which were the first words she +heard distinctly, interested her in his flavour. His person was +noble, handsome, and commanding, even in that situation: but his countenance +soon engrossed her whole care.<br> +<br> +“Heavens! Bianca,” said the Princess softly, “do +I dream? or is not that youth the exact resemblance of Alfonso’s +picture in the gallery?”<br> +<br> +She could say no more, for her father’s voice grew louder at every +word.<br> +<br> +“This bravado,” said he, “surpasses all thy former +insolence. Thou shalt experience the wrath with which thou darest +to trifle. Seize him,” continued Manfred, “and ‘bind +him - the first news the Princess hears of her champion shall be, that +he has lost his head for her sake.”<br> +<br> +“The injustice of which thou art guilty towards me,” said +Theodore, “convinces me that I have done a good deed in delivering +the Princess from thy tyranny. May she be happy, whatever becomes +of me!”<br> +<br> +“This is a lover!” cried Manfred in a rage: “a peasant +within sight of death is not animated by such sentiments. Tell +me, tell me, rash boy, who thou art, or the rack shall force thy secret +from thee.”<br> +<br> +“Thou hast threatened me with death already,” said the youth, +“for the truth I have told thee: if that is all the encouragement +I am to expect for sincerity, I am not tempted to indulge thy vain curiosity +farther.”<br> +<br> +“Then thou wilt not speak?” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“I will not,” replied he.<br> +<br> +“Bear him away into the courtyard,” said Manfred; “I +will see his head this instant severed from his body.”<br> +<br> +Matilda fainted at hearing those words. Bianca shrieked, and cried +-<br> +<br> +“Help! help! the Princess is dead!” Manfred started +at this ejaculation, and demanded what was the matter! The young +peasant, who heard it too, was struck with horror, and asked eagerly +the same question; but Manfred ordered him to be hurried into the court, +and kept there for execution, till he had informed himself of the cause +of Bianca’s shrieks. When he learned the meaning, he treated +it as a womanish panic, and ordering Matilda to be carried to her apartment, +he rushed into the court, and calling for one of his guards, bade Theodore +kneel down, and prepare to receive the fatal blow.<br> +<br> +The undaunted youth received the bitter sentence with a resignation +that touched every heart but Manfred’s. He wished earnestly +to know the meaning of the words he had heard relating to the Princess; +but fearing to exasperate the tyrant more against her, he desisted. +The only boon he deigned to ask was, that he might be permitted to have +a confessor, and make his peace with heaven. Manfred, who hoped +by the confessor’s means to come at the youth’s history, +readily granted his request; and being convinced that Father Jerome +was now in his interest, he ordered him to be called and shrive the +prisoner. The holy man, who had little foreseen the catastrophe +that his imprudence occasioned, fell on his knees to the Prince, and +adjured him in the most solemn manner not to shed innocent blood. +He accused himself in the bitterest terms for his indiscretion, endeavoured +to disculpate the youth, and left no method untried to soften the tyrant’s +rage. Manfred, more incensed than appeased by Jerome’s intercession, +whose retraction now made him suspect he had been imposed upon by both, +commanded the Friar to do his duty, telling him he would not allow the +prisoner many minutes for confession.<br> +<br> +“Nor do I ask many, my Lord,” said the unhappy young man. +“My sins, thank heaven, have not been numerous; nor exceed what +might be expected at my years. Dry your tears, good Father, and +let us despatch. This is a bad world; nor have I had cause to +leave it with regret.”<br> +<br> +“Oh wretched youth!” said Jerome; “how canst thou +bear the sight of me with patience? I am thy murderer! it is I +have brought this dismal hour upon thee!”<br> +<br> +“I forgive thee from my soul,” said the youth, “as +I hope heaven will pardon me. Hear my confession, Father; and +give me thy blessing.”<br> +<br> +“How can I prepare thee for thy passage as I ought?” said +Jerome. “Thou canst not be saved without pardoning thy foes +- and canst thou forgive that impious man there?”<br> +<br> +“I can,” said Theodore; “I do.”<br> +<br> +“And does not this touch thee, cruel Prince?” said the Friar.<br> +<br> +“I sent for thee to confess him,” said Manfred, sternly; +“not to plead for him. Thou didst first incense me against +him - his blood be upon thy head!”<br> +<br> +“It will! it will!” said the good main, in an agony of sorrow. +“Thou and I must never hope to go where this blessed youth is +going!”<br> +<br> +“Despatch!” said Manfred; “I am no more to be moved +by the whining of priests than by the shrieks of women.”<br> +<br> +“What!” said the youth; “is it possible that my fate +could have occasioned what I heard! Is the Princess then again +in thy power?”<br> +<br> +“Thou dost but remember me of my wrath,” said Manfred. +“Prepare thee, for this moment is thy last.”<br> +<br> +The youth, who felt his indignation rise, and who was touched with the +sorrow which he saw he had infused into all the spectators, as well +as into the Friar, suppressed his emotions, and putting off his doublet, +and unbuttoning, his collar, knelt down to his prayers. As he +stooped, his shirt slipped down below his shoulder, and discovered the +mark of a bloody arrow.<br> +<br> +“Gracious heaven!” cried the holy man, starting; “what +do I see? It is my child! my Theodore!”<br> +<br> +The passions that ensued must be conceived; they cannot be painted. +The tears of the assistants were suspended by wonder, rather than stopped +by joy. They seemed to inquire in the eyes of their Lord what +they ought to feel. Surprise, doubt, tenderness, respect, succeeded +each other in the countenance of the youth. He received with modest +submission the effusion of the old man’s tears and embraces. +Yet afraid of giving a loose to hope, and suspecting from what had passed +the inflexibility of Manfred’s temper, he cast a glance towards +the Prince, as if to say, canst thou be unmoved at such a scene as this?<br> +<br> +Manfred’s heart was capable of being touched. He forgot +his anger in his astonishment; yet his pride forbad his owning himself +affected. He even doubted whether this discovery was not a contrivance +of the Friar to save the youth.<br> +<br> +“What may this mean?” said he. “How can he be +thy son? Is it consistent with thy profession or reputed sanctity +to avow a peasant’s offspring for the fruit of thy irregular amours!”<br> +<br> +“Oh, God!” said the holy man, “dost thou question +his being mine? Could I feel the anguish I do if I were not his +father? Spare him! good Prince! spare him! and revile me as thou +pleasest.”<br> +<br> +“Spare him! spare him!” cried the attendants; “for +this good man’s sake!”<br> +<br> +“Peace!” said Manfred, sternly. “I must know +more ere I am disposed to pardon. A Saint’s bastard may +be no saint himself.”<br> +<br> +“Injurious Lord!” said Theodore, “add not insult to +cruelty. If I am this venerable man’s son, though no Prince, +as thou art, know the blood that flows in my veins - ”<br> +<br> +“Yes,” said the Friar, interrupting him, “his blood +is noble; nor is he that abject thing, my Lord, you speak him. +He is my lawful son, and Sicily can boast of few houses more ancient +than that of Falconara. But alas! my Lord, what is blood! what +is nobility! We are all reptiles, miserable, sinful creatures. +It is piety alone that can distinguish us from the dust whence we sprung, +and whither we must return.”<br> +<br> +“Truce to your sermon,” said Manfred; “you forget +you are no longer Friar Jerome, but the Count of Falconara. Let +me know your history; you will have time to moralise hereafter, if you +should not happen to obtain the grace of that sturdy criminal there.”<br> +<br> +“Mother of God!” said the Friar, “is it possible my +Lord can refuse a father the life of his only, his long-lost, child! +Trample me, my Lord, scorn, afflict me, accept my life for his, but +spare my son!”<br> +<br> +“Thou canst feel, then,” said Manfred, “what it is +to lose an only son! A little hour ago thou didst preach up resignation +to me: <i>my</i> house, if fate so pleased, must perish - but the Count +of Falconara - ”<br> +<br> +“Alas! my Lord,” said Jerome, “I confess I have offended; +but aggravate not an old man’s sufferings! I boast not of +my family, nor think of such vanities - it is nature, that pleads for +this boy; it is the memory of the dear woman that bore him. Is +she, Theodore, is she dead?”<br> +<br> +“Her soul has long been with the blessed,” said Theodore.<br> +<br> +“Oh! how?” cried Jerome, “tell me - no - she is happy! +Thou art all my care now! - Most dread Lord! will you - will you grant +me my poor boy’s life?”<br> +<br> +“Return to thy convent,” answered Manfred; “conduct +the Princess hither; obey me in what else thou knowest; and I promise +thee the life of thy son.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! my Lord,” said Jerome, “is my honesty the price +I must pay for this dear youth’s safety?”<br> +<br> +“For me!” cried Theodore. “Let me die a thousand +deaths, rather than stain thy conscience. What is it the tyrant +would exact of thee? Is the Princess still safe from his power? +Protect her, thou venerable old man; and let all the weight of his wrath +fall on me.”<br> +<br> +Jerome endeavoured to check the impetuosity of the youth; and ere Manfred +could reply, the trampling of horses was heard, and a brazen trumpet, +which hung without the gate of the castle, was suddenly sounded. +At the same instant the sable plumes on the enchanted helmet, which +still remained at the other end of the court, were tempestuously agitated, +and nodded thrice, as if bowed by some invisible wearer.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +CHAPTER III.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Manfred’s heart misgave him when he beheld the plumage on the +miraculous casque shaken in concert with the sounding of the brazen +trumpet.<br> +<br> +“Father!” said he to Jerome, whom he now ceased to treat +as Count of Falconara, “what mean these portents? If I have +offended - ” the plumes were shaken with greater violence than +before.<br> +<br> +“Unhappy Prince that I am,” cried Manfred. “Holy +Father! will you not assist me with your prayers?”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” replied Jerome, “heaven is no doubt displeased +with your mockery of its servants. Submit yourself to the church; +and cease to persecute her ministers. Dismiss this innocent youth; +and learn to respect the holy character I wear. Heaven will not +be trifled with: you see - ” the trumpet sounded again.<br> +<br> +“I acknowledge I have been too hasty,” said Manfred. +“Father, do you go to the wicket, and demand who is at the gate.”<br> +<br> +“Do you grant me the life of Theodore?” replied the Friar.<br> +<br> +“I do,” said Manfred; “but inquire who is without!”<br> +<br> +Jerome, falling on the neck of his son, discharged a flood of tears, +that spoke the fulness of his soul.<br> +<br> +“You promised to go to the gate,” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“I thought,” replied the Friar, “your Highness would +excuse my thanking you first in this tribute of my heart.”<br> +<br> +“Go, dearest Sir,” said Theodore; “obey the Prince. +I do not deserve that you should delay his satisfaction for me.”<br> +<br> +Jerome, inquiring who was without, was answered, “A Herald.”<br> +<br> +“From whom?” said he.<br> +<br> +“From the Knight of the Gigantic Sabre,” said the Herald; +“and I must speak with the usurper of Otranto.”<br> +<br> +Jerome returned to the Prince, and did not fail to repeat the message +in the very words it had been uttered. The first sounds struck +Manfred with terror; but when he heard himself styled usurper, his rage +rekindled, and all his courage revived.<br> +<br> +“Usurper! - insolent villain!” cried he; “who dares +to question my title? Retire, Father; this is no business for +Monks: I will meet this presumptuous man myself. Go to your convent +and prepare the Princess’s return. Your son shall be a hostage +for your fidelity: his life depends on your obedience.”<br> +<br> +“Good heaven! my Lord,” cried Jerome, “your Highness +did but this instant freely pardon my child - have you so soon forgot +the interposition of heaven?”<br> +<br> +“Heaven,” replied Manfred, “does not send Heralds +to question the title of a lawful Prince. I doubt whether it even +notifies its will through Friars - but that is your affair, not mine. +At present you know my pleasure; and it is not a saucy Herald that shall +save your son, if you do not return with the Princess.”<br> +<br> +It was in vain for the holy man to reply. Manfred commanded him +to be conducted to the postern-gate, and shut out from the castle. +And he ordered some of his attendants to carry Theodore to the top of +the black tower, and guard him strictly; scarce permitting the father +and son to exchange a hasty embrace at parting. He then withdrew +to the hall, and seating himself in princely state, ordered the Herald +to be admitted to his presence.<br> +<br> +“Well! thou insolent!” said the Prince, “what wouldst +thou with me?”<br> +<br> +“I come,” replied he, “to thee, Manfred, usurper of +the principality of Otranto, from the renowned and invincible Knight, +the Knight of the Gigantic Sabre: in the name of his Lord, Frederic, +Marquis of Vicenza, he demands the Lady Isabella, daughter of that Prince, +whom thou hast basely and traitorously got into thy power, by bribing +her false guardians during his absence; and he requires thee to resign +the principality of Otranto, which thou hast usurped from the said Lord +Frederic, the nearest of blood to the last rightful Lord, Alfonso the +Good. If thou dost not instantly comply with these just demands, +he defies thee to single combat to the last extremity.” +And so saying the Herald cast down his warder.<br> +<br> +“And where is this braggart who sends thee?” said Manfred.<br> +<br> +“At the distance of a league,” said the Herald: “he +comes to make good his Lord’s claim against thee, as he is a true +knight, and thou an usurper and ravisher.”<br> +<br> +Injurious as this challenge was, Manfred reflected that it was not his +interest to provoke the Marquis. He knew how well founded the +claim of Frederic was; nor was this the first time he had heard of it. +Frederic’s ancestors had assumed the style of Princes of Otranto, +from the death of Alfonso the Good without issue; but Manfred, his father, +and grandfather, had been too powerful for the house of Vicenza to dispossess +them. Frederic, a martial and amorous young Prince, had married +a beautiful young lady, of whom he was enamoured, and who had died in +childbed of Isabella. Her death affected him so much that he had +taken the cross and gone to the Holy Land, where he was wounded in an +engagement against the infidels, made prisoner, and reported to be dead. +When the news reached Manfred’s ears, he bribed the guardians +of the Lady Isabella to deliver her up to him as a bride for his son +Conrad, by which alliance he had proposed to unite the claims of the +two houses. This motive, on Conrad’s death, had co-operated +to make him so suddenly resolve on espousing her himself; and the same +reflection determined him now to endeavour at obtaining the consent +of Frederic to this marriage. A like policy inspired him with +the thought of inviting Frederic’s champion into the castle, lest +he should be informed of Isabella’s flight, which he strictly +enjoined his domestics not to disclose to any of the Knight’s +retinue.<br> +<br> +“Herald,” said Manfred, as soon as he had digested these +reflections, “return to thy master, and tell him, ere we liquidate +our differences by the sword, Manfred would hold some converse with +him. Bid him welcome to my castle, where by my faith, as I am +a true Knight, he shall have courteous reception, and full security +for himself and followers. If we cannot adjust our quarrel by +amicable means, I swear he shall depart in safety, and shall have full +satisfaction according to the laws of arms: So help me God and His holy +Trinity!”<br> +<br> +The Herald made three obeisances and retired.<br> +<br> +During this interview Jerome’s mind was agitated by a thousand +contrary passions. He trembled for the life of his son, and his +first thought was to persuade Isabella to return to the castle. +Yet he was scarce less alarmed at the thought of her union with Manfred. +He dreaded Hippolita’s unbounded submission to the will of her +Lord; and though he did not doubt but he could alarm her piety not to +consent to a divorce, if he could get access to her; yet should Manfred +discover that the obstruction came from him, it might be equally fatal +to Theodore. He was impatient to know whence came the Herald, +who with so little management had questioned the title of Manfred: yet +he did not dare absent himself from the convent, lest Isabella should +leave it, and her flight be imputed to him. He returned disconsolately +to the monastery, uncertain on what conduct to resolve. A Monk, +who met him in the porch and observed his melancholy air, said -<br> +<br> +“Alas! brother, is it then true that we have lost our excellent +Princess Hippolita?”<br> +<br> +The holy man started, and cried, “What meanest thou, brother? +I come this instant from the castle, and left her in perfect health.”<br> +<br> +“Martelli,” replied the other Friar, “passed by the +convent but a quarter of an hour ago on his way from the castle, and +reported that her Highness was dead. All our brethren are gone +to the chapel to pray for her happy transit to a better life, and willed +me to wait thy arrival. They know thy holy attachment to that +good Lady, and are anxious for the affliction it will cause in thee +- indeed we have all reason to weep; she was a mother to our house. +But this life is but a pilgrimage; we must not murmur - we shall all +follow her! May our end be like hers!”<br> +<br> + “Good brother, thou dreamest,” said Jerome. +“I tell thee I come from the castle, and left the Princess well. +Where is the Lady Isabella?”<br> +<br> +“Poor Gentlewoman!” replied the Friar; “I told her +the sad news, and offered her spiritual comfort. I reminded her +of the transitory condition of mortality, and advised her to take the +veil: I quoted the example of the holy Princess Sanchia of Arragon.”<br> +<br> +“Thy zeal was laudable,” said Jerome, impatiently; “but +at present it was unnecessary: Hippolita is well - at least I trust +in the Lord she is; I heard nothing to the contrary - yet, methinks, +the Prince’s earnestness - Well, brother, but where is the Lady +Isabella?”<br> +<br> +“I know not,” said the Friar; “she wept much, and +said she would retire to her chamber.”<br> +<br> +Jerome left his comrade abruptly, and hastened to the Princess, but +she was not in her chamber. He inquired of the domestics of the +convent, but could learn no news of her. He searched in vain throughout +the monastery and the church, and despatched messengers round the neighbourhood, +to get intelligence if she had been seen; but to no purpose. Nothing +could equal the good man’s perplexity. He judged that Isabella, +suspecting Manfred of having precipitated his wife’s death, had +taken the alarm, and withdrawn herself to some more secret place of +concealment. This new flight would probably carry the Prince’s +fury to the height. The report of Hippolita’s death, though +it seemed almost incredible, increased his consternation; and though +Isabella’s escape bespoke her aversion of Manfred for a husband, +Jerome could feel no comfort from it, while it endangered the life of +his son. He determined to return to the castle, and made several +of his brethren accompany him to attest his innocence to Manfred, and, +if necessary, join their intercession with his for Theodore.<br> +<br> +The Prince, in the meantime, had passed into the court, and ordered +the gates of the castle to be flung open for the reception of the stranger +Knight and his train. In a few minutes the cavalcade arrived. +First came two harbingers with wands. Next a herald, followed +by two pages and two trumpets. Then a hundred foot-guards. +These were attended by as many horse. After them fifty footmen, +clothed in scarlet and black, the colours of the Knight. Then +a led horse. Two heralds on each side of a gentleman on horseback +bearing a banner with the arms of Vicenza and Otranto quarterly - a +circumstance that much offended Manfred - but he stifled his resentment. +Two more pages. The Knight’s confessor telling his beads. +Fifty more footmen clad as before. Two Knights habited in complete +armour, their beavers down, comrades to the principal Knight. +The squires of the two Knights, carrying their shields and devices. +The Knight’s own squire. A hundred gentlemen bearing an +enormous sword, and seeming to faint under the weight of it. The +Knight himself on a chestnut steed, in complete armour, his lance in +the rest, his face entirely concealed by his vizor, which was surmounted +by a large plume of scarlet and black feathers. Fifty foot-guards +with drums and trumpets closed the procession, which wheeled off to +the right and left to make room for the principal Knight.<br> +<br> +As soon as he approached the gate he stopped; and the herald advancing, +read again the words of the challenge. Manfred’s eyes were +fixed on the gigantic sword, and he scarce seemed to attend to the cartel: +but his attention was soon diverted by a tempest of wind that rose behind +him. He turned and beheld the Plumes of the enchanted helmet agitated +in the same extraordinary manner as before. It required intrepidity +like Manfred’s not to sink under a concurrence of circumstances +that seemed to announce his fate. Yet scorning in the presence +of strangers to betray the courage he had always manifested, he said +boldly -<br> +<br> +“Sir Knight, whoever thou art, I bid thee welcome. If thou +art of mortal mould, thy valour shall meet its equal: and if thou art +a true Knight, thou wilt scorn to employ sorcery to carry thy point. +Be these omens from heaven or hell, Manfred trusts to the righteousness +of his cause and to the aid of St. Nicholas, who has ever protected +his house. Alight, Sir Knight, and repose thyself. To-morrow +thou shalt have a fair field, and heaven befriend the juster side!”<br> +<br> +The Knight made no reply, but dismounting, was conducted by Manfred +to the great hall of the castle. As they traversed the court, +the Knight stopped to gaze on the miraculous casque; and kneeling down, +seemed to pray inwardly for some minutes. Rising, he made a sign +to the Prince to lead on. As soon as they entered the hall, Manfred +proposed to the stranger to disarm, but the Knight shook his head in +token of refusal.<br> +<br> +“Sir Knight,” said Manfred, “this is not courteous, +but by my good faith I will not cross thee, nor shalt thou have cause +to complain of the Prince of Otranto. No treachery is designed +on my part; I hope none is intended on thine; here take my gage” +(giving him his ring): “your friends and you shall enjoy the laws +of hospitality. Rest here until refreshments are brought. +I will but give orders for the accommodation of your train, and return +to you.” The three Knights bowed as accepting his courtesy. +Manfred directed the stranger’s retinue to be conducted to an +adjacent hospital, founded by the Princess Hippolita for the reception +of pilgrims. As they made the circuit of the court to return towards +the gate, the gigantic sword burst from the supporters, and falling +to the ground opposite to the helmet, remained immovable. Manfred, +almost hardened to preternatural appearances, surmounted the shock of +this new prodigy; and returning to the hall, where by this time the +feast was ready, he invited his silent guests to take their places. +Manfred, however ill his heart was at ease, endeavoured to inspire the +company with mirth. He put several questions to them, but was +answered only by signs. They raised their vizors but sufficiently +to feed themselves, and that sparingly.<br> +<br> +“Sirs” said the Prince, “ye are the first guests I +ever treated within these walls who scorned to hold any intercourse +with me: nor has it oft been customary, I ween, for princes to hazard +their state and dignity against strangers and mutes. You say you +come in the name of Frederic of Vicenza; I have ever heard that he was +a gallant and courteous Knight; nor would he, I am bold to say, think +it beneath him to mix in social converse with a Prince that is his equal, +and not unknown by deeds in arms. Still ye are silent - well! +be it as it may - by the laws of hospitality and chivalry ye are masters +under this roof: ye shall do your pleasure. But come, give me +a goblet of wine; ye will not refuse to pledge me to the healths of +your fair mistresses.”<br> +<br> +The principal Knight sighed and crossed himself, and was rising from +the board.<br> +<br> +“Sir Knight,” said Manfred, “what I said was but in +sport. I shall constrain you in nothing: use your good liking. +Since mirth is not your mood, let us be sad. Business may hit +your fancies better. Let us withdraw, and hear if what I have +to unfold may be better relished than the vain efforts I have made for +your pastime.”<br> +<br> +Manfred then conducting the three Knights into an inner chamber, shut +the door, and inviting them to be seated, began thus, addressing himself +to the chief personage:-<br> +<br> +“You come, Sir Knight, as I understand, in the name of the Marquis +of Vicenza, to re-demand the Lady Isabella, his daughter, who has been +contracted in the face of Holy Church to my son, by the consent of her +legal guardians; and to require me to resign my dominions to your Lord, +who gives himself for the nearest of blood to Prince Alfonso, whose +soul God rest! I shall speak to the latter article of your demands +first. You must know, your Lord knows, that I enjoy the principality +of Otranto from my father, Don Manuel, as he received it from his father, +Don Ricardo. Alfonso, their predecessor, dying childless in the +Holy Land, bequeathed his estates to my grandfather, Don Ricardo, in +consideration of his faithful services.” The stranger shook +his head.<br> +<br> +“Sir Knight,” said Manfred, warmly, “Ricardo was a +valiant and upright man; he was a pious man; witness his munificent +foundation of the adjoining church and two converts. He was peculiarly +patronised by St. Nicholas - my grandfather was incapable - I say, Sir, +Don Ricardo was incapable - excuse me, your interruption has disordered +me. I venerate the memory of my grandfather. Well, Sirs, +he held this estate; he held it by his good sword and by the favour +of St. Nicholas - so did my father; and so, Sirs, will I, come what +come will. But Frederic, your Lord, is nearest in blood. +I have consented to put my title to the issue of the sword. Does +that imply a vicious title? I might have asked, where is Frederic +your Lord? Report speaks him dead in captivity. You say, +your actions say, he lives - I question it not - I might, Sirs, I might +- but I do not. Other Princes would bid Frederic take his inheritance +by force, if he can: they would not stake their dignity on a single +combat: they would not submit it to the decision of unknown mutes! - +pardon me, gentlemen, I am too warm: but suppose yourselves in my situation: +as ye are stout Knights, would it not move your choler to have your +own and the honour of your ancestors called in question?”<br> +<br> +“But to the point. Ye require me to deliver up the Lady +Isabella. Sirs, I must ask if ye are authorised to receive her?”<br> +<br> +The Knight nodded.<br> +<br> +“Receive her,” continued Manfred; “well, you are authorised +to receive her, but, gentle Knight, may I ask if you have full powers?”<br> +<br> +The Knight nodded.<br> +<br> +“’Tis well,” said Manfred; “then hear what I +have to offer. Ye see, gentlemen, before you, the most unhappy +of men!” (he began to weep); “afford me your compassion; +I am entitled to it, indeed I am. Know, I have lost my only hope, +my joy, the support of my house - Conrad died yester morning.”<br> +<br> +The Knights discovered signs of surprise.<br> +<br> +“Yes, Sirs, fate has disposed of my son. Isabella is at +liberty.”<br> +<br> +“Do you then restore her?” cried the chief Knight, breaking +silence.<br> +<br> +“Afford me your patience,” said Manfred. “I +rejoice to find, by this testimony of your goodwill, that this matter +may be adjusted without blood. It is no interest of mine dictates +what little I have farther to say. Ye behold in me a man disgusted +with the world: the loss of my son has weaned me from earthly cares. +Power and greatness have no longer any charms in my eyes. I wished +to transmit the sceptre I had received from my ancestors with honour +to my son - but that is over! Life itself is so indifferent to +me, that I accepted your defiance with joy. A good Knight cannot +go to the grave with more satisfaction than when falling in his vocation: +whatever is the will of heaven, I submit; for alas! Sirs, I am a man +of many sorrows. Manfred is no object of envy, but no doubt you +are acquainted with my story.”<br> +<br> +The Knight made signs of ignorance, and seemed curious to have Manfred +proceed.<br> +<br> +“Is it possible, Sirs,” continued the Prince, “that +my story should be a secret to you? Have you heard nothing relating +to me and the Princess Hippolita?”<br> +<br> +They shook their heads.<br> +<br> +“No! Thus, then, Sirs, it is. You think me ambitious: +ambition, alas! is composed of more rugged materials. If I were +ambitious, I should not for so many years have been a prey to all the +hell of conscientious scruples. But I weary your patience: I will +be brief. Know, then, that I have long been troubled in mind on +my union with the Princess Hippolita. Oh! Sirs, if ye were acquainted +with that excellent woman! if ye knew that I adore her like a mistress, +and cherish her as a friend - but man was not born for perfect happiness! +She shares my scruples, and with her consent I have brought this matter +before the church, for we are related within the forbidden degrees. +I expect every hour the definitive sentence that must separate us for +ever - I am sure you feel for me - I see you do - pardon these tears!”<br> +<br> +The Knights gazed on each other, wondering where this would end.<br> +<br> +Manfred continued -<br> +<br> +“The death of my son betiding while my soul was under this anxiety, +I thought of nothing but resigning my dominions, and retiring for ever +from the sight of mankind. My only difficulty was to fix on a +successor, who would be tender of my people, and to dispose of the Lady +Isabella, who is dear to me as my own blood. I was willing to +restore the line of Alfonso, even in his most distant kindred. +And though, pardon me, I am satisfied it was his will that Ricardo’s +lineage should take place of his own relations; yet where was I to search +for those relations? I knew of none but Frederic, your Lord; he +was a captive to the infidels, or dead; and were he living, and at home, +would he quit the flourishing State of Vicenza for the inconsiderable +principality of Otranto? If he would not, could I bear the thought +of seeing a hard, unfeeling, Viceroy set over my poor faithful people? +for, Sirs, I love my people, and thank heaven am beloved by them. +But ye will ask whither tends this long discourse? Briefly, then, +thus, Sirs. Heaven in your arrival seems to point out a remedy +for these difficulties and my misfortunes. The Lady Isabella is +at liberty; I shall soon be so. I would submit to anything for +the good of my people. Were it not the best, the only way to extinguish +the feuds between our families, if I was to take the Lady Isabella to +wife? You start. But though Hippolita’s virtues will +ever be dear to me, a Prince must not consider himself; he is born for +his people.” A servant at that instant entering the chamber +apprised Manfred that Jerome and several of his brethren demanded immediate +access to him.<br> +<br> +The Prince, provoked at this interruption, and fearing that the Friar +would discover to the strangers that Isabella had taken sanctuary, was +going to forbid Jerome’s entrance. But recollecting that +he was certainly arrived to notify the Princess’s return, Manfred +began to excuse himself to the Knights for leaving them for a few moments, +but was prevented by the arrival of the Friars. Manfred angrily +reprimanded them for their intrusion, and would have forced them back +from the chamber; but Jerome was too much agitated to be repulsed. +He declared aloud the flight of Isabella, with protestations of his +own innocence.<br> +<br> +Manfred, distracted at the news, and not less at its coming to the knowledge +of the strangers, uttered nothing but incoherent sentences, now upbraiding +the Friar, now apologising to the Knights, earnest to know what was +become of Isabella, yet equally afraid of their knowing; impatient to +pursue her, yet dreading to have them join in the pursuit. He +offered to despatch messengers in quest of her, but the chief Knight, +no longer keeping silence, reproached Manfred in bitter terms for his +dark and ambiguous dealing, and demanded the cause of Isabella’s +first absence from the castle. Manfred, casting a stern look at +Jerome, implying a command of silence, pretended that on Conrad’s +death he had placed her in sanctuary until he could determine how to +dispose of her. Jerome, who trembled for his son’s life, +did not dare contradict this falsehood, but one of his brethren, not +under the same anxiety, declared frankly that she had fled to their +church in the preceding night. The Prince in vain endeavoured +to stop this discovery, which overwhelmed him with shame and confusion. +The principal stranger, amazed at the contradictions he heard, and more +than half persuaded that Manfred had secreted the Princess, notwithstanding +the concern he expressed at her flight, rushing to the door, said -<br> +<br> +“Thou traitor Prince! Isabella shall be found.”<br> +<br> +Manfred endeavoured to hold him, but the other Knights assisting their +comrade, he broke from the Prince, and hastened into the court, demanding +his attendants. Manfred, finding it vain to divert him from the +pursuit, offered to accompany him and summoning his attendants, and +taking Jerome and some of the Friars to guide them, they issued from +the castle; Manfred privately giving orders to have the Knight’s +company secured, while to the knight he affected to despatch a messenger +to require their assistance.<br> +<br> +The company had no sooner quitted the castle than Matilda, who felt +herself deeply interested for the young peasant, since she had seen +him condemned to death in the hall, and whose thoughts had been taken +up with concerting measures to save him, was informed by some of the +female attendants that Manfred had despatched all his men various ways +in pursuit of Isabella. He had in his hurry given this order in +general terms, not meaning to extend it to the guard he had set upon +Theodore, but forgetting it. The domestics, officious to obey +so peremptory a Prince, and urged by their own curiosity and love of +novelty to join in any precipitate chase, had to a man left the castle. +Matilda disengaged herself from her women, stole up to the black tower, +and unbolting the door, presented herself to the astonished Theodore.<br> +<br> +“Young man,” said she, “though filial duty and womanly +modesty condemn the step I am taking, yet holy charity, surmounting +all other ties, justifies this act. Fly; the doors of thy prison +are open: my father and his domestics are absent; but they may soon +return. Be gone in safety; and may the angels of heaven direct +thy course!”<br> +<br> +“Thou art surely one of those angels!” said the enraptured +Theodore: “none but a blessed saint could speak, could act - could +look - like thee. May I not know the name of my divine protectress? +Methought thou namedst thy father. Is it possible? Can Manfred’s +blood feel holy pity! Lovely Lady, thou answerest not. But +how art thou here thyself? Why dost thou neglect thy own safety, +and waste a thought on a wretch like Theodore? Let us fly together: +the life thou bestowest shall be dedicated to thy defence.”<br> +<br> +“Alas! thou mistakest,” said Matilda, signing: “I +am Manfred’s daughter, but no dangers await me.”<br> +<br> +“Amazement!” said Theodore; “but last night I blessed +myself for yielding thee the service thy gracious compassion so charitably +returns me now.”<br> +<br> +“Still thou art in an error,” said the Princess; “but +this is no time for explanation. Fly, virtuous youth, while it +is in my power to save thee: should my father return, thou and I both +should indeed have cause to tremble.”<br> +<br> +“How!” said Theodore; “thinkest thou, charming maid, +that I will accept of life at the hazard of aught calamitous to thee? +Better I endured a thousand deaths.”<br> +<br> +“I run no risk,” said Matilda, “but by thy delay. +Depart; it cannot be known that I have assisted thy flight.”<br> +<br> +“Swear by the saints above,” said Theodore, “that +thou canst not be suspected; else here I vow to await whatever can befall +me.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! thou art too generous,” said Matilda; “but rest +assured that no suspicion can alight on me.”<br> +<br> +“Give me thy beauteous hand in token that thou dost not deceive +me,” said Theodore; “and let me bathe it with the warm tears +of gratitude.”<br> +<br> +“Forbear!” said the Princess; “this must not be.”<br> +<br> +“Alas!” said Theodore, “I have never known but calamity +until this hour - perhaps shall never know other fortune again: suffer +the chaste raptures of holy gratitude: ’tis my soul would print +its effusions on thy hand.”<br> +<br> +“Forbear, and be gone,” said Matilda. “How would +Isabella approve of seeing thee at my feet?”<br> +<br> +“Who is Isabella?” said the young man with surprise.<br> +<br> +“Ah, me! I fear,” said the Princess, “I am serving +a deceitful one. Hast thou forgot thy curiosity this morning?”<br> +<br> +“Thy looks, thy actions, all thy beauteous self seem an emanation +of divinity,” said Theodore; “but thy words are dark and +mysterious. Speak, Lady; speak to thy servant’s comprehension.”<br> +<br> +“Thou understandest but too well!” said Matilda; “but +once more I command thee to be gone: thy blood, which I may preserve, +will be on my head, if I waste the time in vain discourse.”<br> +<br> +“I go, Lady,” said Theodore, “because it is thy will, +and because I would not bring the grey hairs of my father with sorrow +to the grave. Say but, adored Lady, that I have thy gentle pity.”<br> +<br> +“Stay,” said Matilda; “I will conduct thee to the +subterraneous vault by which Isabella escaped; it will lead thee to +the church of St. Nicholas, where thou mayst take sanctuary.”<br> +<br> +“What!” said Theodore, “was it another, and not thy +lovely self that I assisted to find the subterraneous passage?”<br> +<br> +“It was,” said Matilda; “but ask no more; I tremble +to see thee still abide here; fly to the sanctuary.”<br> +<br> +“To sanctuary,” said Theodore; “no, Princess; sanctuaries +are for helpless damsels, or for criminals. Theodore’s soul +is free from guilt, nor will wear the appearance of it. Give me +a sword, Lady, and thy father shall learn that Theodore scorns an ignominious +flight.”<br> +<br> +“Rash youth!” said Matilda; “thou wouldst not dare +to lift thy presumptuous arm against the Prince of Otranto?”<br> +<br> +“Not against thy father; indeed, I dare not,” said Theodore. +“Excuse me, Lady; I had forgotten. But could I gaze on thee, +and remember thou art sprung from the tyrant Manfred! But he is +thy father, and from this moment my injuries are buried in oblivion.”<br> +<br> +A deep and hollow groan, which seemed to come from above, startled the +Princess and Theodore.<br> +<br> +“Good heaven! we are overheard!” said the Princess. +They listened; but perceiving no further noise, they both concluded +it the effect of pent-up vapours. And the Princess, preceding +Theodore softly, carried him to her father’s armoury, where, equipping +him with a complete suit, he was conducted by Matilda to the postern-gate.<br> +<br> +“Avoid the town,” said the Princess, “and all the +western side of the castle. ’Tis there the search must be +making by Manfred and the strangers; but hie thee to the opposite quarter. +Yonder behind that forest to the east is a chain of rocks, hollowed +into a labyrinth of caverns that reach to the sea coast. There +thou mayst lie concealed, till thou canst make signs to some vessel +to put on shore, and take thee off. Go! heaven be thy guide! - +and sometimes in thy prayers remember - Matilda!”<br> +<br> +Theodore flung himself at her feet, and seizing her lily hand, which +with struggles she suffered him to kiss, he vowed on the earliest opportunity +to get himself knighted, and fervently entreated her permission to swear +himself eternally her knight. Ere the Princess could reply, a +clap of thunder was suddenly heard that shook the battlements. +Theodore, regardless of the tempest, would have urged his suit: but +the Princess, dismayed, retreated hastily into the castle, and commanded +the youth to be gone with an air that would not be disobeyed. +He sighed, and retired, but with eyes fixed on the gate, until Matilda, +closing it, put an end to an interview, in which the hearts of both +had drunk so deeply of a passion, which both now tasted for the first +time.<br> +<br> +Theodore went pensively to the convent, to acquaint his father with +his deliverance. There he learned the absence of Jerome, and the +pursuit that was making after the Lady Isabella, with some particulars +of whose story he now first became acquainted. The generous gallantry +of his nature prompted him to wish to assist her; but the Monks could +lend him no lights to guess at the route she had taken. He was +not tempted to wander far in search of her, for the idea of Matilda +had imprinted itself so strongly on his heart, that he could not bear +to absent himself at much distance from her abode. The tenderness +Jerome had expressed for him concurred to confirm this reluctance; and +he even persuaded himself that filial affection was the chief cause +of his hovering between the castle and monastery.<br> +<br> +Until Jerome should return at night, Theodore at length determined to +repair to the forest that Matilda had pointed out to him. Arriving +there, he sought the gloomiest shades, as best suited to the pleasing +melancholy that reigned in his mind. In this mood he roved insensibly +to the caves which had formerly served as a retreat to hermits, and +were now reported round the country to be haunted by evil spirits. +He recollected to have heard this tradition; and being of a brave and +adventurous disposition, he willingly indulged his curiosity in exploring +the secret recesses of this labyrinth. He had not penetrated far +before he thought he heard the steps of some person who seemed to retreat +before him.<br> +<br> +Theodore, though firmly grounded in all our holy faith enjoins to be +believed, had no apprehension that good men were abandoned without cause +to the malice of the powers of darkness. He thought the place +more likely to be infested by robbers than by those infernal agents +who are reported to molest and bewilder travellers. He had long +burned with impatience to approve his valour. Drawing his sabre, +he marched sedately onwards, still directing his steps as the imperfect +rustling sound before him led the way. The armour he wore was +a like indication to the person who avoided him. Theodore, now +convinced that he was not mistaken, redoubled his pace, and evidently +gained on the person that fled, whose haste increasing, Theodore came +up just as a woman fell breathless before him. He hasted to raise +her, but her terror was so great that he apprehended she would faint +in his arms. He used every gentle word to dispel her alarms, and +assured her that far from injuring, he would defend her at the peril +of his life. The Lady recovering her spirits from his courteous +demeanour, and gazing on her protector, said -<br> +<br> +“Sure, I have heard that voice before!”<br> +<br> +“Not to my knowledge,” replied Theodore; “unless, +as I conjecture, thou art the Lady Isabella.”<br> +<br> +“Merciful heaven!” cried she. “Thou art not +sent in quest of me, art thou?” And saying those words, +she threw herself at his feet, and besought him not to deliver her up +to Manfred.<br> +<br> +“To Manfred!” cried Theodore - “no, Lady; I have once +already delivered thee from his tyranny, and it shall fare hard with +me now, but I will place thee out of the reach of his daring.”<br> +<br> +“Is it possible,” said she, “that thou shouldst be +the generous unknown whom I met last night in the vault of the castle? +Sure thou art not a mortal, but my guardian angel. On my knees, +let me thank - ”<br> +<br> +“Hold! gentle Princess,” said Theodore, “nor demean +thyself before a poor and friendless young man. If heaven has +selected me for thy deliverer, it will accomplish its work, and strengthen +my arm in thy cause. But come, Lady, we are too near the mouth +of the cavern; let us seek its inmost recesses. I can have no +tranquillity till I have placed thee beyond the reach of danger.”<br> +<br> +“Alas! what mean you, sir?” said she. “Though +all your actions are noble, though your sentiments speak the purity +of your soul, is it fitting that I should accompany you alone into these +perplexed retreats? Should we be found together, what would a +censorious world think of my conduct?”<br> +<br> +“I respect your virtuous delicacy,” said Theodore; “nor +do you harbour a suspicion that wounds my honour. I meant to conduct +you into the most private cavity of these rocks, and then at the hazard +of my life to guard their entrance against every living thing. +Besides, Lady,” continued he, drawing a deep sigh, “beauteous +and all perfect as your form is, and though my wishes are not guiltless +of aspiring, know, my soul is dedicated to another; and although - ” +A sudden noise prevented Theodore from proceeding. They soon distinguished +these sounds -<br> +<br> +“Isabella! what, ho! Isabella!” The trembling Princess +relapsed into her former agony of fear. Theodore endeavoured to +encourage her, but in vain. He assured her he would die rather +than suffer her to return under Manfred’s power; and begging her +to remain concealed, he went forth to prevent the person in search of +her from approaching.<br> +<br> +At the mouth of the cavern he found an armed Knight, discoursing with +a peasant, who assured him he had seen a lady enter the passes of the +rock. The Knight was preparing to seek her, when Theodore, placing +himself in his way, with his sword drawn, sternly forbad him at his +peril to advance.<br> +<br> +“And who art thou, who darest to cross my way?” said the +Knight, haughtily.<br> +<br> +“One who does not dare more than he will perform,” said +Theodore.<br> +<br> +“I seek the Lady Isabella,” said the Knight, “and +understand she has taken refuge among these rocks. Impede me not, +or thou wilt repent having provoked my resentment.”<br> +<br> +“Thy purpose is as odious as thy resentment is contemptible,” +said Theodore. “Return whence thou camest, or we shall soon +know whose resentment is most terrible.”<br> +<br> +The stranger, who was the principal Knight that had arrived from the +Marquis of Vicenza, had galloped from Manfred as he was busied in getting +information of the Princess, and giving various orders to prevent her +falling into the power of the three Knights. Their chief had suspected +Manfred of being privy to the Princess’s absconding, and this +insult from a man, who he concluded was stationed by that Prince to +secrete her, confirming his suspicions, he made no reply, but discharging +a blow with his sabre at Theodore, would soon have removed all obstruction, +if Theodore, who took him for one of Manfred’s captains, and who +had no sooner given the provocation than prepared to support it, had +not received the stroke on his shield. The valour that had so +long been smothered in his breast broke forth at once; he rushed impetuously +on the Knight, whose pride and wrath were not less powerful incentives +to hardy deeds. The combat was furious, but not long. Theodore +wounded the Knight in three several places, and at last disarmed him +as he fainted by the loss of blood.<br> +<br> +The peasant, who had fled on the first onset, had given the alarm to +some of Manfred’s domestics, who, by his orders, were dispersed +through the forest in pursuit of Isabella. They came up as the +Knight fell, whom they soon discovered to be the noble stranger. +Theodore, notwithstanding his hatred to Manfred, could not behold the +victory he had gained without emotions of pity and generosity. +But he was more touched when he learned the quality of his adversary, +and was informed that he was no retainer, but an enemy, of Manfred. +He assisted the servants of the latter in disarming the Knight, and +in endeavouring to stanch the blood that flowed from his wounds. +The Knight recovering his speech, said, in a faint and faltering voice +-<br> +<br> +“Generous foe, we have both been in an error. I took thee +for an instrument of the tyrant; I perceive thou hast made the like +mistake. It is too late for excuses. I faint. If Isabella +is at hand - call her - I have important secrets to - ”<br> +<br> +“He is dying!” said one of the attendants; “has nobody +a crucifix about them? Andrea, do thou pray over him.”<br> +<br> +“Fetch some water,” said Theodore, “and pour it down +his throat, while I hasten to the Princess.”<br> +<br> +Saying this, he flew to Isabella, and in few words told her modestly +that he had been so unfortunate by mistake as to wound a gentleman from +her father’s court, who wished, ere he died, to impart something +of consequence to her.<br> +<br> +The Princess, who had been transported at hearing the voice of Theodore, +as he called to her to come forth, was astonished at what she heard. +Suffering herself to be conducted by Theodore, the new proof of whose +valour recalled her dispersed spirits, she came where the bleeding Knight +lay speechless on the ground. But her fears returned when she +beheld the domestics of Manfred. She would again have fled if +Theodore had not made her observe that they were unarmed, and had not +threatened them with instant death if they should dare to seize the +Princess.<br> +<br> +The stranger, opening his eyes, and beholding a woman, said, “Art +thou - pray tell me truly - art thou Isabella of Vicenza?”<br> +<br> +“I am,” said she: “good heaven restore thee!”<br> +<br> + “Then thou - then thou” - said the Knight, struggling +for utterance - “seest - thy father. Give me one - ”<br> +<br> +“Oh! amazement! horror! what do I hear! what do I see!” +cried Isabella. “My father! You my father! How +came you here, Sir? For heaven’s sake, speak! Oh! +run for help, or he will expire!”<br> +<br> +“’Tis most true,” said the wounded Knight, exerting +all his force; “I am Frederic thy father. Yes, I came to +deliver thee. It will not be. Give me a parting kiss, and +take - ”<br> +<br> +“Sir,” said Theodore, “do not exhaust yourself; suffer +us to convey you to the castle.”<br> +<br> +“To the castle!” said Isabella. “Is there no +help nearer than the castle? Would you expose my father to the +tyrant? If he goes thither, I dare not accompany him; and yet, +can I leave him!”<br> +<br> +“My child,” said Frederic, “it matters not for me +whither I am carried. A few minutes will place me beyond danger; +but while I have eyes to dote on thee, forsake me not, dear Isabella! +This brave Knight - I know not who he is - will protect thy innocence. +Sir, you will not abandon my child, will you?”<br> +<br> +Theodore, shedding tears over his victim, and vowing to guard the Princess +at the expense of his life, persuaded Frederic to suffer himself to +be conducted to the castle. They placed him on a horse belonging +to one of the domestics, after binding up his wounds as well as they +were able. Theodore marched by his side; and the afflicted Isabella, +who could not bear to quit him, followed mournfully behind.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +CHAPTER IV.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +The sorrowful troop no sooner arrived at the castle, than they were +met by Hippolita and Matilda, whom Isabella had sent one of the domestics +before to advertise of their approach. The ladies causing Frederic +to be conveyed into the nearest chamber, retired, while the surgeons +examined his wounds. Matilda blushed at seeing Theodore and Isabella +together; but endeavoured to conceal it by embracing the latter, and +condoling with her on her father’s mischance. The surgeons +soon came to acquaint Hippolita that none of the Marquis’s wounds +were dangerous; and that he was desirous of seeing his daughter and +the Princesses.<br> +<br> +Theodore, under pretence of expressing his joy at being freed from his +apprehensions of the combat being fatal to Frederic, could not resist +the impulse of following Matilda. Her eyes were so often cast +down on meeting his, that Isabella, who regarded Theodore as attentively +as he gazed on Matilda, soon divined who the object was that he had +told her in the cave engaged his affections. While this mute scene +passed, Hippolita demanded of Frederic the cause of his having taken +that mysterious course for reclaiming his daughter; and threw in various +apologies to excuse her Lord for the match contracted between their +children.<br> +<br> +Frederic, however incensed against Manfred, was not insensible to the +courtesy and benevolence of Hippolita: but he was still more struck +with the lovely form of Matilda. Wishing to detain them by his +bedside, he informed Hippolita of his story. He told her that, +while prisoner to the infidels, he had dreamed that his daughter, of +whom he had learned no news since his captivity, was detained in a castle, +where she was in danger of the most dreadful misfortunes: and that if +he obtained his liberty, and repaired to a wood near Joppa, he would +learn more. Alarmed at this dream, and incapable of obeying the +direction given by it, his chains became more grievous than ever. +But while his thoughts were occupied on the means of obtaining his liberty, +he received the agreeable news that the confederate Princes who were +warring in Palestine had paid his ransom. He instantly set out +for the wood that had been marked in his dream.<br> +<br> +For three days he and his attendants had wandered in the forest without +seeing a human form: but on the evening of the third they came to a +cell, in which they found a venerable hermit in the agonies of death. +Applying rich cordials, they brought the fainting man to his speech.<br> +<br> +“My sons,” said he, “I am bounden to your charity +- but it is in vain - I am going to my eternal rest - yet I die with +the satisfaction of performing the will of heaven. When first +I repaired to this solitude, after seeing my country become a prey to +unbelievers - it is alas! above fifty years since I was witness to that +dreadful scene! St. Nicholas appeared to me, and revealed a secret, +which he bade me never disclose to mortal man, but on my death-bed. +This is that tremendous hour, and ye are no doubt the chosen warriors +to whom I was ordered to reveal my trust. As soon as ye have done +the last offices to this wretched corse, dig under the seventh tree +on the left hand of this poor cave, and your pains will - Oh! good heaven +receive my soul!” With those words the devout man breathed +his last.<br> +<br> +“By break of day,” continued Frederic, “when we had +committed the holy relics to earth, we dug according to direction. +But what was our astonishment when about the depth of six feet we discovered +an enormous sabre - the very weapon yonder in the court. On the +blade, which was then partly out of the scabbard, though since closed +by our efforts in removing it, were written the following lines - no; +excuse me, Madam,” added the Marquis, turning to Hippolita; “if +I forbear to repeat them: I respect your sex and rank, and would not +be guilty of offending your ear with sounds injurious to aught that +is dear to you.”<br> +<br> +He paused. Hippolita trembled. She did not doubt but Frederic +was destined by heaven to accomplish the fate that seemed to threaten +her house. Looking with anxious fondness at Matilda, a silent +tear stole down her cheek: but recollecting herself, she said -<br> +<br> +“Proceed, my Lord; heaven does nothing in vain; mortals must receive +its divine behests with lowliness and submission. It is our part +to deprecate its wrath, or bow to its decrees. Repeat the sentence, +my Lord; we listen resigned.”<br> +<br> +Frederic was grieved that he had proceeded so far. The dignity +and patient firmness of Hippolita penetrated him with respect, and the +tender silent affection with which the Princess and her daughter regarded +each other, melted him almost to tears. Yet apprehensive that +his forbearance to obey would be more alarming, he repeated in a faltering +and low voice the following lines:<br> +<br> +<br> +“Where’er a casque that suits this sword is found,<br> +With perils is thy daughter compass’d round;<br> +<i>Alfonso’s</i> blood alone can save the maid,<br> +And quiet a long restless Prince’s shade.”<br> +<br> +<br> +“What is there in these lines,” said Theodore impatiently, +“that affects these Princesses? Why were they to be shocked +by a mysterious delicacy, that has so little foundation?”<br> +<br> +“Your words are rude, young man,” said the Marquis; “and +though fortune has favoured you once - ”<br> +<br> +“My honoured Lord,” said Isabella, who resented Theodore’s +warmth, which she perceived was dictated by his sentiments for Matilda, +“discompose not yourself for the glosing of a peasant’s +son: he forgets the reverence he owes you; but he is not accustomed +- ”<br> +<br> +Hippolita, concerned at the heat that had arisen, checked Theodore for +his boldness, but with an air acknowledging his zeal; and changing the +conversation, demanded of Frederic where he had left her Lord? +As the Marquis was going to reply, they heard a noise without, and rising +to inquire the cause, Manfred, Jerome, and part of the troop, who had +met an imperfect rumour of what had happened, entered the chamber. +Manfred advanced hastily towards Frederic’s bed to condole with +him on his misfortune, and to learn the circumstances of the combat, +when starting in an agony of terror and amazement, he cried -<br> +<br> +“Ha! what art thou? thou dreadful spectre! is my hour come?”<br> +<br> +“My dearest, gracious Lord,” cried Hippolita, clasping him +in her arms, “what is it you see! Why do you fix your eye-balls +thus?”<br> +<br> +“What!” cried Manfred breathless; “dost thou see nothing, +Hippolita? Is this ghastly phantom sent to me alone - to rue, +who did not - ”<br> +<br> +“For mercy’s sweetest self, my Lord,” said Hippolita, +“resume your soul, command your reason. There is none here, +but us, your friends.”<br> +<br> +“What, is not that Alfonso?” cried Manfred. “Dost +thou not see him? can it be my brain’s delirium?”<br> +<br> +“This! my Lord,” said Hippolita; “this is Theodore, +the youth who has been so unfortunate.”<br> +<br> +“Theodore!” said Manfred mournfully, and striking his forehead; +“Theodore or a phantom, he has unhinged the soul of Manfred. +But how comes he here? and how comes he in armour?”<br> +<br> +“I believe he went in search of Isabella,” said Hippolita.<br> +<br> +“Of Isabella!” said Manfred, relapsing into rage; “yes, +yes, that is not doubtful -. But how did he escape from durance +in which I left him? Was it Isabella, or this hypocritical old +Friar, that procured his enlargement?”<br> +<br> +“And would a parent be criminal, my Lord,” said Theodore, +“if he meditated the deliverance of his child?”<br> +<br> +Jerome, amazed to hear himself in a manner accused by his son, and without +foundation, knew not what to think. He could not comprehend how +Theodore had escaped, how he came to be armed, and to encounter Frederic. +Still he would not venture to ask any questions that might tend to inflame +Manfred’s wrath against his son. Jerome’s silence +convinced Manfred that he had contrived Theodore’s release.<br> +<br> +“And is it thus, thou ungrateful old man,” said the Prince, +addressing himself to the Friar, “that thou repayest mine and +Hippolita’s bounties? And not content with traversing my +heart’s nearest wishes, thou armest thy bastard, and bringest +him into my own castle to insult me!”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said Theodore, “you wrong my father: neither +he nor I are capable of harbouring a thought against your peace. +Is it insolence thus to surrender myself to your Highness’s pleasure?” +added he, laying his sword respectfully at Manfred’s feet. +“Behold my bosom; strike, my Lord, if you suspect that a disloyal +thought is lodged there. There is not a sentiment engraven on +my heart that does not venerate you and yours.”<br> +<br> +The grace and fervour with which Theodore uttered these words interested +every person present in his favour. Even Manfred was touched - +yet still possessed with his resemblance to Alfonso, his admiration +was dashed with secret horror.<br> +<br> +“Rise,” said he; “thy life is not my present purpose. +But tell me thy history, and how thou camest connected with this old +traitor here.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said Jerome eagerly.<br> +<br> +“Peace! impostor!” said Manfred; “I will not have +him prompted.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said Theodore, “I want no assistance; my +story is very brief. I was carried at five years of age to Algiers +with my mother, who had been taken by corsairs from the coast of Sicily. +She died of grief in less than a twelvemonth;” the tears gushed +from Jerome’s eyes, on whose countenance a thousand anxious passions +stood expressed. “Before she died,” continued Theodore, +“she bound a writing about my arm under my garments, which told +me I was the son of the Count Falconara.”<br> +<br> +“It is most true,” said Jerome; “I am that wretched +father.”<br> +<br> +“Again I enjoin thee silence,” said Manfred: “proceed.”<br> +<br> +“I remained in slavery,” said Theodore, “until within +these two years, when attending on my master in his cruises, I was delivered +by a Christian vessel, which overpowered the pirate; and discovering +myself to the captain, he generously put me on shore in Sicily; but +alas! instead of finding a father, I learned that his estate, which +was situated on the coast, had, during his absence, been laid waste +by the Rover who had carried my mother and me into captivity: that his +castle had been burnt to the ground, and that my father on his return +had sold what remained, and was retired into religion in the kingdom +of Naples, but where no man could inform me. Destitute and friendless, +hopeless almost of attaining the transport of a parent’s embrace, +I took the first opportunity of setting sail for Naples, from whence, +within these six days, I wandered into this province, still supporting +myself by the labour of my hands; nor until yester-morn did I believe +that heaven had reserved any lot for me but peace of mind and contented +poverty. This, my Lord, is Theodore’s story. I am +blessed beyond my hope in finding a father; I am unfortunate beyond +my desert in having incurred your Highness’s displeasure.”<br> +<br> +He ceased. A murmur of approbation gently arose from the audience.<br> +<br> +“This is not all,” said Frederic; “I am bound in honour +to add what he suppresses. Though he is modest, I must be generous; +he is one of the bravest youths on Christian ground. He is warm +too; and from the short knowledge I have of him, I will pledge myself +for his veracity: if what he reports of himself were not true, he would +not utter it - and for me, youth, I honour a frankness which becomes +thy birth; but now, and thou didst offend me: yet the noble blood which +flows in thy veins, may well be allowed to boil out, when it has so +recently traced itself to its source. Come, my Lord,” (turning +to Manfred), “if I can pardon him, surely you may; it is not the +youth’s fault, if you took him for a spectre.”<br> +<br> +This bitter taunt galled the soul of Manfred.<br> +<br> +“If beings from another world,” replied he haughtily, “have +power to impress my mind with awe, it is more than living man can do; +nor could a stripling’s arm.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” interrupted Hippolita, “your guest has +occasion for repose: shall we not leave him to his rest?” +Saying this, and taking Manfred by the hand, she took leave of Frederic, +and led the company forth.<br> +<br> +The Prince, not sorry to quit a conversation which recalled to mind +the discovery he had made of his most secret sensations, suffered himself +to be conducted to his own apartment, after permitting Theodore, though +under engagement to return to the castle on the morrow (a condition +the young man gladly accepted), to retire with his father to the convent. +Matilda and Isabella were too much occupied with their own reflections, +and too little content with each other, to wish for farther converse +that night. They separated each to her chamber, with more expressions +of ceremony and fewer of affection thou had passed between them since +their childhood.<br> +<br> +If they parted with small cordiality, they did but meet with greater +impatience, as soon as the sun was risen. Their minds were in +a situation that excluded sleep, and each recollected a thousand questions +which she wished she had put to the other overnight. Matilda reflected +that Isabella had been twice delivered by Theodore in very critical +situations, which she could not believe accidental. His eyes, +it was true, had been fixed on her in Frederic’s chamber; but +that might have been to disguise his passion for Isabella from the fathers +of both. It were better to clear this up. She wished to +know the truth, lest she should wrong her friend by entertaining a passion +for Isabella’s lover. Thus jealousy prompted, and at the +same time borrowed an excuse from friendship to justify its curiosity.<br> +<br> +Isabella, not less restless, had better foundation for her suspicions. +Both Theodore’s tongue and eyes had told her his heart was engaged; +it was true - yet, perhaps, Matilda might not correspond to his passion; +she had ever appeared insensible to love: all her thoughts were set +on heaven.<br> +<br> +“Why did I dissuade her?” said Isabella to herself; “I +am punished for my generosity; but when did they meet? where? +It cannot be; I have deceived myself; perhaps last night was the first +time they ever beheld each other; it must be some other object that +has prepossessed his affections - if it is, I am not so unhappy as I +thought; if it is not my friend Matilda - how! Can I stoop to +wish for the affection of a man, who rudely and unnecessarily acquainted +me with his indifference? and that at the very moment in which common +courtesy demanded at least expressions of civility. I will go +to my dear Matilda, who will confirm me in this becoming pride. +Man is false - I will advise with her on taking the veil: she will rejoice +to find me in this disposition; and I will acquaint her that I no longer +oppose her inclination for the cloister.”<br> +<br> +In this frame of mind, and determined to open her heart entirely to +Matilda, she went to that Princess’s chamber, whom she found already +dressed, and leaning pensively on her arm. This attitude, so correspondent +to what she felt herself, revived Isabella’s suspicions, and destroyed +the confidence she had purposed to place in her friend. They blushed +at meeting, and were too much novices to disguise their sensations with +address. After some unmeaning questions and replies, Matilda demanded +of Isabella the cause of her flight? The latter, who had almost +forgotten Manfred’s passion, so entirely was she occupied by her +own, concluding that Matilda referred to her last escape from the convent, +which had occasioned the events of the preceding evening, replied -<br> +<br> +“Martelli brought word to the convent that your mother was dead.”<br> +<br> +“Oh!” said Matilda, interrupting her, “Bianca has +explained that mistake to me: on seeing me faint, she cried out, ‘The +Princess is dead!’ and Martelli, who had come for the usual dole +to the castle - ”<br> +<br> +“And what made you faint?” said Isabella, indifferent to +the rest. Matilda blushed and stammered -<br> +<br> +“My father - he was sitting in judgment on a criminal - ”<br> +<br> +“What criminal?” said Isabella eagerly.<br> +<br> +“A young man,” said Matilda; “I believe - ”<br> +<br> +“I think it was that young man that - ”<br> +<br> +“What, Theodore?” said Isabella.<br> +<br> +“Yes,” answered she; “I never saw him before; I do +not know how he had offended my father, but as he has been of service +to you, I am glad my Lord has pardoned him.”<br> +<br> +“Served me!” replied Isabella; “do you term it serving +me, to wound my father, and almost occasion his death? Though +it is but since yesterday that I am blessed with knowing a parent, I +hope Matilda does not think I am such a stranger to filial tenderness +as not to resent the boldness of that audacious youth, and that it is +impossible for me ever to feel any affection for one who dared to lift +his arm against the author of my being. No, Matilda, my heart +abhors him; and if you still retain the friendship for me that you have +vowed from your infancy, you will detest a man who has been on the point +of making me miserable for ever.”<br> +<br> +Matilda held down her head and replied: “I hope my dearest Isabella +does not doubt her Matilda’s friendship: I never beheld that youth +until yesterday; he is almost a stranger to me: but as the surgeons +have pronounced your father out of danger, you ought not to harbour +uncharitable resentment against one, who I am persuaded did not know +the Marquis was related to you.”<br> +<br> +“You plead his cause very pathetically,” said Isabella, +“considering he is so much a stranger to you! I am mistaken, +or he returns your charity.”<br> +<br> +“What mean you?” said Matilda.<br> +<br> +“Nothing,” said Isabella, repenting that she had given Matilda +a hint of Theodore’s inclination for her. Then changing +the discourse, she asked Matilda what occasioned Manfred to take Theodore +for a spectre?<br> +<br> +“Bless me,” said Matilda, “did not you observe his +extreme resemblance to the portrait of Alfonso in the gallery? +I took notice of it to Bianca even before I saw him in armour; but with +the helmet on, he is the very image of that picture.”<br> +<br> +“I do not much observe pictures,” said Isabella: “much +less have I examined this young man so attentively as you seem to have +done. Ah? Matilda, your heart is in danger, but let me warn +you as a friend, he has owned to me that he is in love; it cannot be +with you, for yesterday was the first time you ever met - was it not?”<br> +<br> +“Certainly,” replied Matilda; “but why does my dearest +Isabella conclude from anything I have said, that” - she paused +- then continuing: “he saw you first, and I am far from having +the vanity to think that my little portion of charms could engage a +heart devoted to you; may you be happy, Isabella, whatever is the fate +of Matilda!”<br> +<br> +“My lovely friend,” said Isabella, whose heart was too honest +to resist a kind expression, “it is you that Theodore admires; +I saw it; I am persuaded of it; nor shall a thought of my own happiness +suffer me to interfere with yours.”<br> +<br> +This frankness drew tears from the gentle Matilda; and jealousy that +for a moment had raised a coolness between these amiable maidens soon +gave way to the natural sincerity and candour of their souls. +Each confessed to the other the impression that Theodore had made on +her; and this confidence was followed by a struggle of generosity, each +insisting on yielding her claim to her friend. At length the dignity +of Isabella’s virtue reminding her of the preference which Theodore +had almost declared for her rival, made her determine to conquer her +passion, and cede the beloved object to her friend.<br> +<br> +During this contest of amity, Hippolita entered her daughter’s +chamber.<br> +<br> +“Madam,” said she to Isabella, “you have so much tenderness +for Matilda, and interest yourself so kindly in whatever affects our +wretched house, that I can have no secrets with my child which are not +proper for you to hear.”<br> +<br> +The princesses were all attention and anxiety.<br> +<br> +“Know then, Madam,” continued Hippolita, “and you +my dearest Matilda, that being convinced by all the events of these +two last ominous days, that heaven purposes the sceptre of Otranto should +pass from Manfred’s hands into those of the Marquis Frederic, +I have been perhaps inspired with the thought of averting our total +destruction by the union of our rival houses. With this view I +have been proposing to Manfred, my lord, to tender this dear, dear child +to Frederic, your father.”<br> +<br> +“Me to Lord Frederic!” cried Matilda; “good heavens! +my gracious mother - and have you named it to my father?”<br> +<br> +“I have,” said Hippolita; “he listened benignly to +my proposal, and is gone to break it to the Marquis.”<br> +<br> +“Ah! wretched princess!” cried Isabella; “what hast +thou done! what ruin has thy inadvertent goodness been preparing for +thyself, for me, and for Matilda!”<br> +<br> +“Ruin from me to you and to my child!” said Hippolita “what +can this mean?”<br> +<br> +“Alas!” said Isabella, “the purity of your own heart +prevents your seeing the depravity of others. Manfred, your lord, +that impious man - ”<br> +<br> +“Hold,” said Hippolita; “you must not in my presence, +young lady, mention Manfred with disrespect: he is my lord and husband, +and - ”<br> +<br> +“Will not long be so,” said Isabella, “if his wicked +purposes can be carried into execution.”<br> +<br> +“This language amazes me,” said Hippolita. “Your +feeling, Isabella, is warm; but until this hour I never knew it betray +you into intemperance. What deed of Manfred authorises you to +treat him as a murderer, an assassin?”<br> +<br> +“Thou virtuous, and too credulous Princess!” replied Isabella; +“it is not thy life he aims at - it is to separate himself from +thee! to divorce thee! to - ”<br> +<br> +“To divorce me!” “To divorce my mother!” +cried Hippolita and Matilda at once.<br> +<br> +“Yes,” said Isabella; “and to complete his crime, +he meditates - I cannot speak it!”<br> +<br> +“What can surpass what thou hast already uttered?” said +Matilda.<br> +<br> +Hippolita was silent. Grief choked her speech; and the recollection +of Manfred’s late ambiguous discourses confirmed what she heard.<br> +<br> +“Excellent, dear lady! madam! mother!” cried Isabella, flinging +herself at Hippolita’s feet in a transport of passion; “trust +me, believe me, I will die a thousand deaths sooner than consent to +injure you, than yield to so odious - oh! - ”<br> +<br> +“This is too much!” cried Hippolita: “What crimes +does one crime suggest! Rise, dear Isabella; I do not doubt your +virtue. Oh! Matilda, this stroke is too heavy for thee! weep not, +my child; and not a murmur, I charge thee. Remember, he is thy +father still!”<br> +<br> +“But you are my mother too,” said Matilda fervently; “and +you are virtuous, you are guiltless! - Oh! must not I, must not I complain?”<br> +<br> +“You must not,” said Hippolita - “come, all will yet +be well. Manfred, in the agony for the loss of thy brother, knew +not what he said; perhaps Isabella misunderstood him; his heart is good +- and, my child, thou knowest not all! There is a destiny hangs +over us; the hand of Providence is stretched out; oh! could I but save +thee from the wreck! Yes,” continued she in a firmer tone, +“perhaps the sacrifice of myself may atone for all; I will go +and offer myself to this divorce - it boots not what becomes of me. +I will withdraw into the neighbouring monastery, and waste the remainder +of life in prayers and tears for my child and - the Prince!”<br> +<br> +“Thou art as much too good for this world,” said Isabella, +“as Manfred is execrable; but think not, lady, that thy weakness +shall determine for me. I swear, hear me all ye angels - ”<br> +<br> +“Stop, I adjure thee,” cried Hippolita: “remember +thou dost not depend on thyself; thou hast a father.”<br> +<br> +“My father is too pious, too noble,” interrupted Isabella, +“to command an impious deed. But should he command it; can +a father enjoin a cursed act? I was contracted to the son, can +I wed the father? No, madam, no; force should not drag me to Manfred’s +hated bed. I loathe him, I abhor him: divine and human laws forbid +- and my friend, my dearest Matilda! would I wound her tender soul by +injuring her adored mother? my own mother - I never have known another” +-<br> +<br> +“Oh! she is the mother of both!” cried Matilda: “can +we, can we, Isabella, adore her too much?”<br> +<br> +“My lovely children,” said the touched Hippolita, “your +tenderness overpowers me - but I must not give way to it. It is +not ours to make election for ourselves: heaven, our fathers, and our +husbands must decide for us. Have patience until you hear what +Manfred and Frederic have determined. If the Marquis accepts Matilda’s +hand, I know she will readily obey. Heaven may interpose and prevent +the rest. What means my child?” continued she, seeing Matilda +fall at her feet with a flood of speechless tears - “But no; answer +me not, my daughter: I must not hear a word against the pleasure of +thy father.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! doubt not my obedience, my dreadful obedience to him and +to you!” said Matilda. “But can I, most respected +of women, can I experience all this tenderness, this world of goodness, +and conceal a thought from the best of mothers?”<br> +<br> +“What art thou going to utter?” said Isabella trembling. +“Recollect thyself, Matilda.”<br> +<br> +“No, Isabella,” said the Princess, “I should not deserve +this incomparable parent, if the inmost recesses of my soul harboured +a thought without her permission - nay, I have offended her; I have +suffered a passion to enter my heart without her avowal - but here I +disclaim it; here I vow to heaven and her - ”<br> +<br> +“My child! my child;” said Hippolita, “what words +are these! what new calamities has fate in store for us! Thou, +a passion? Thou, in this hour of destruction - ”<br> +<br> +“Oh! I see all my guilt!” said Matilda. “I abhor +myself, if I cost my mother a pang. She is the dearest thing I +have on earth - Oh! I will never, never behold him more!”<br> +<br> +“Isabella,” said Hippolita, “thou art conscious to +this unhappy secret, whatever it is. Speak!”<br> +<br> +“What!” cried Matilda, “have I so forfeited my mother’s +love, that she will not permit me even to speak my own guilt? oh! wretched, +wretched Matilda!”<br> +<br> +“Thou art too cruel,” said Isabella to Hippolita: “canst +thou behold this anguish of a virtuous mind, and not commiserate it?”<br> +<br> +“Not pity my child!” said Hippolita, catching Matilda in +her arms - “Oh! I know she is good, she is all virtue, all tenderness, +and duty. I do forgive thee, my excellent, my only hope!”<br> +<br> +The princesses then revealed to Hippolita their mutual inclination for +Theodore, and the purpose of Isabella to resign him to Matilda. +Hippolita blamed their imprudence, and showed them the improbability +that either father would consent to bestow his heiress on so poor a +man, though nobly born. Some comfort it gave her to find their +passion of so recent a date, and that Theodore had had but little cause +to suspect it in either. She strictly enjoined them to avoid all +correspondence with him. This Matilda fervently promised: but +Isabella, who flattered herself that she meant no more than to promote +his union with her friend, could not determine to avoid him; and made +no reply.<br> +<br> +“I will go to the convent,” said Hippolita, “and order +new masses to be said for a deliverance from these calamities.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! my mother,” said Matilda, “you mean to quit us: +you mean to take sanctuary, and to give my father an opportunity of +pursuing his fatal intention. Alas! on my knees I supplicate you +to forbear; will you leave me a prey to Frederic? I will follow +you to the convent.”<br> +<br> +“Be at peace, my child,” said Hippolita: “I will return +instantly. I will never abandon thee, until I know it is the will +of heaven, and for thy benefit.”<br> +<br> +“Do not deceive me,” said Matilda. “I will not +marry Frederic until thou commandest it. Alas! what will become +of me?”<br> +<br> +“Why that exclamation?” said Hippolita. “I have +promised thee to return - ”<br> +<br> +“Ah! my mother,” replied Matilda, “stay and save me +from myself. A frown from thee can do more than all my father’s +severity. I have given away my heart, and you alone can make me +recall it.”<br> +<br> +“No more,” said Hippolita; “thou must not relapse, +Matilda.”<br> +<br> +“I can quit Theodore,” said she, “but must I wed another? +let me attend thee to the altar, and shut myself from the world for +ever.”<br> +<br> +“Thy fate depends on thy father,” said Hippolita; “I +have ill-bestowed my tenderness, if it has taught thee to revere aught +beyond him. Adieu! my child: I go to pray for thee.”<br> +<br> +Hippolita’s real purpose was to demand of Jerome, whether in conscience +she might not consent to the divorce. She had oft urged Manfred +to resign the principality, which the delicacy of her conscience rendered +an hourly burthen to her. These scruples concurred to make the +separation from her husband appear less dreadful to her than it would +have seemed in any other situation.<br> +<br> +Jerome, at quitting the castle overnight, had questioned Theodore severely +why he had accused him to Manfred of being privy to his escape. +Theodore owned it had been with design to prevent Manfred’s suspicion +from alighting on Matilda; and added, the holiness of Jerome’s +life and character secured him from the tyrant’s wrath. +Jerome was heartily grieved to discover his son’s inclination +for that princess; and leaving him to his rest, promised in the morning +to acquaint him with important reasons for conquering his passion.<br> +<br> +Theodore, like Isabella, was too recently acquainted with parental authority +to submit to its decisions against the impulse of his heart. He +had little curiosity to learn the Friar’s reasons, and less disposition +to obey them. The lovely Matilda had made stronger impressions +on him than filial affection. All night he pleased himself with +visions of love; and it was not till late after the morning-office, +that he recollected the Friar’s commands to attend him at Alfonso’s +tomb.<br> +<br> +“Young man,” said Jerome, when he saw him, “this tardiness +does not please me. Have a father’s commands already so +little weight?”<br> +<br> +Theodore made awkward excuses, and attributed his delay to having overslept +himself.<br> +<br> +“And on whom were thy dreams employed?” said the Friar sternly. +His son blushed. “Come, come,” resumed the Friar, +“inconsiderate youth, this must not be; eradicate this guilty +passion from thy breast - ”<br> +<br> +“Guilty passion!” cried Theodore: “Can guilt dwell +with innocent beauty and virtuous modesty?”<br> +<br> +“It is sinful,” replied the Friar, “to cherish those +whom heaven has doomed to destruction. A tyrant’s race must +be swept from the earth to the third and fourth generation.”<br> +<br> +“Will heaven visit the innocent for the crimes of the guilty?” +said Theodore. “The fair Matilda has virtues enough - ”<br> +<br> +“To undo thee:” interrupted Jerome. “Hast thou +so soon forgotten that twice the savage Manfred has pronounced thy sentence?”<br> +<br> +“Nor have I forgotten, sir,” said Theodore, “that +the charity of his daughter delivered me from his power. I can +forget injuries, but never benefits.”<br> +<br> +“The injuries thou hast received from Manfred’s race,” +said the Friar, “are beyond what thou canst conceive. Reply +not, but view this holy image! Beneath this marble monument rest +the ashes of the good Alfonso; a prince adorned with every virtue: the +father of his people! the delight of mankind! Kneel, headstrong +boy, and list, while a father unfolds a tale of horror that will expel +every sentiment from thy soul, but sensations of sacred vengeance - +Alfonso! much injured prince! let thy unsatisfied shade sit awful on +the troubled air, while these trembling lips - Ha! who comes there? +- ”<br> +<br> +“The most wretched of women!” said Hippolita, entering the +choir. “Good Father, art thou at leisure? - but why this +kneeling youth? what means the horror imprinted on each countenance? +why at this venerable tomb - alas! hast thou seen aught?”<br> +<br> +“We were pouring forth our orisons to heaven,” replied the +Friar, with some confusion, “to put an end to the woes of this +deplorable province. Join with us, Lady! thy spotless soul may +obtain an exemption from the judgments which the portents of these days +but too speakingly denounce against thy house.”<br> +<br> +“I pray fervently to heaven to divert them,” said the pious +Princess. “Thou knowest it has been the occupation of my +life to wrest a blessing for my Lord and my harmless children. - One +alas! is taken from me! would heaven but hear me for my poor Matilda! +Father! intercede for her!”<br> +<br> +“Every heart will bless her,” cried Theodore with rapture.<br> +<br> +“Be dumb, rash youth!” said Jerome. “And thou, +fond Princess, contend not with the Powers above! the Lord giveth, and +the Lord taketh away: bless His holy name, and submit to his decrees.”<br> +<br> +“I do most devoutly,” said Hippolita; “but will He +not spare my only comfort? must Matilda perish too? - ah! Father, +I came - but dismiss thy son. No ear but thine must hear what +I have to utter.”<br> +<br> +“May heaven grant thy every wish, most excellent Princess!” +said Theodore retiring. Jerome frowned.<br> +<br> +Hippolita then acquainted the Friar with the proposal she had suggested +to Manfred, his approbation of it, and the tender of Matilda that he +was gone to make to Frederic. Jerome could not conceal his dislike +of the notion, which he covered under pretence of the improbability +that Frederic, the nearest of blood to Alfonso, and who was come to +claim his succession, would yield to an alliance with the usurper of +his right. But nothing could equal the perplexity of the Friar, +when Hippolita confessed her readiness not to oppose the separation, +and demanded his opinion on the legality of her acquiescence. +The Friar caught eagerly at her request of his advice, and without explaining +his aversion to the proposed marriage of Manfred and Isabella, he painted +to Hippolita in the most alarming colours the sinfulness of her consent, +denounced judgments against her if she complied, and enjoined her in +the severest terms to treat any such proposition with every mark of +indignation and refusal.<br> +<br> +Manfred, in the meantime, had broken his purpose to Frederic, and proposed +the double marriage. That weak Prince, who had been struck with +the charms of Matilda, listened but too eagerly to the offer. +He forgot his enmity to Manfred, whom he saw but little hope of dispossessing +by force; and flattering himself that no issue might succeed from the +union of his daughter with the tyrant, he looked upon his own succession +to the principality as facilitated by wedding Matilda. He made +faint opposition to the proposal; affecting, for form only, not to acquiesce +unless Hippolita should consent to the divorce. Manfred took that +upon himself.<br> +<br> +Transported with his success, and impatient to see himself in a situation +to expect sons, he hastened to his wife’s apartment, determined +to extort her compliance. He learned with indignation that she +was absent at the convent. His guilt suggested to him that she +had probably been informed by Isabella of his purpose. He doubted +whether her retirement to the convent did not import an intention of +remaining there, until she could raise obstacles to their divorce; and +the suspicions he had already entertained of Jerome, made him apprehend +that the Friar would not only traverse his views, but might have inspired +Hippolita with the resolution of talking sanctuary. Impatient +to unravel this clue, and to defeat its success, Manfred hastened to +the convent, and arrived there as the Friar was earnestly exhorting +the Princess never to yield to the divorce.<br> +<br> +“Madam,” said Manfred, “what business drew you hither? +why did you not await my return from the Marquis?”<br> +<br> +“I came to implore a blessing on your councils,” replied +Hippolita.<br> +<br> +“My councils do not need a Friar’s intervention,” +said Manfred; “and of all men living is that hoary traitor the +only one whom you delight to confer with?”<br> +<br> +“Profane Prince!” said Jerome; “is it at the altar +that thou choosest to insult the servants of the altar? - but, Manfred, +thy impious schemes are known. Heaven and this virtuous lady know +them - nay, frown not, Prince. The Church despises thy menaces. +Her thunders will be heard above thy wrath. Dare to proceed in +thy cursed purpose of a divorce, until her sentence be known, and here +I lance her anathema at thy head.”<br> +<br> +“Audacious rebel!” said Manfred, endeavouring to conceal +the awe with which the Friar’s words inspired him. “Dost +thou presume to threaten thy lawful Prince?”<br> +<br> +“Thou art no lawful Prince,” said Jerome; “thou art +no Prince - go, discuss thy claim with Frederic; and when that is done +- ”<br> +<br> +“It is done,” replied Manfred; “Frederic accepts Matilda’s +hand, and is content to waive his claim, unless I have no male issue” +- as he spoke those words three drops of blood fell from the nose of +Alfonso’s statue. Manfred turned pale, and the Princess +sank on her knees.<br> +<br> +“Behold!” said the Friar; “mark this miraculous indication +that the blood of Alfonso will never mix with that of Manfred!”<br> +<br> +“My gracious Lord,” said Hippolita, “let us submit +ourselves to heaven. Think not thy ever obedient wife rebels against +thy authority. I have no will but that of my Lord and the Church. +To that revered tribunal let us appeal. It does not depend on +us to burst the bonds that unite us. If the Church shall approve +the dissolution of our marriage, be it so - I have but few years, and +those of sorrow, to pass. Where can they be worn away so well +as at the foot of this altar, in prayers for thine and Matilda’s +safety?”<br> +<br> +“But thou shalt not remain here until then,” said Manfred. +“Repair with me to the castle, and there I will advise on the +proper measures for a divorce; - but this meddling Friar comes not thither; +my hospitable roof shall never more harbour a traitor - and for thy +Reverence’s offspring,” continued he, “I banish him +from my dominions. He, I ween, is no sacred personage, nor under +the protection of the Church. Whoever weds Isabella, it shall +not be Father Falconara’s started-up son.”<br> +<br> +“They start up,” said the Friar, “who are suddenly +beheld in the seat of lawful Princes; but they wither away like the +grass, and their place knows them no more.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, casting a look of scorn at the Friar, led Hippolita forth; +but at the door of the church whispered one of his attendants to remain +concealed about the convent, and bring him instant notice, if any one +from the castle should repair thither.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +CHAPTER V.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Every reflection which Manfred made on the Friar’s behaviour, +conspired to persuade him that Jerome was privy to an amour between +Isabella and Theodore. But Jerome’s new presumption, so +dissonant from his former meekness, suggested still deeper apprehensions. +The Prince even suspected that the Friar depended on some secret support +from Frederic, whose arrival, coinciding with the novel appearance of +Theodore, seemed to bespeak a correspondence. Still more was he +troubled with the resemblance of Theodore to Alfonso’s portrait. +The latter he knew had unquestionably died without issue. Frederic +had consented to bestow Isabella on him. These contradictions +agitated his mind with numberless pangs.<br> +<br> +He saw but two methods of extricating himself from his difficulties. +The one was to resign his dominions to the Marquis - pride, ambition, +and his reliance on ancient prophecies, which had pointed out a possibility +of his preserving them to his posterity, combated that thought. +The other was to press his marriage with Isabella. After long +ruminating on these anxious thoughts, as he marched silently with Hippolita +to the castle, he at last discoursed with that Princess on the subject +of his disquiet, and used every insinuating and plausible argument to +extract her consent to, even her promise of promoting the divorce. +Hippolita needed little persuasions to bend her to his pleasure. +She endeavoured to win him over to the measure of resigning his dominions; +but finding her exhortations fruitless, she assured him, that as far +as her conscience would allow, she would raise no opposition to a separation, +though without better founded scruples than what he yet alleged, she +would not engage to be active in demanding it.<br> +<br> +This compliance, though inadequate, was sufficient to raise Manfred’s +hopes. He trusted that his power and wealth would easily advance +his suit at the court of Rome, whither he resolved to engage Frederic +to take a journey on purpose. That Prince had discovered so much +passion for Matilda, that Manfred hoped to obtain all he wished by holding +out or withdrawing his daughter’s charms, according as the Marquis +should appear more or less disposed to co-operate in his views. +Even the absence of Frederic would be a material point gained, until +he could take further measures for his security.<br> +<br> +Dismissing Hippolita to her apartment, he repaired to that of the Marquis; +but crossing the great hall through which he was to pass he met Bianca. +The damsel he knew was in the confidence of both the young ladies. +It immediately occurred to him to sift her on the subject of Isabella +and Theodore. Calling her aside into the recess of the oriel window +of the hall, and soothing her with many fair words and promises, he +demanded of her whether she knew aught of the state of Isabella’s +affections.<br> +<br> +“I! my Lord! no my Lord - yes my Lord - poor Lady! she is wonderfully +alarmed about her father’s wounds; but I tell her he will do well; +don’t your Highness think so?”<br> +<br> +“I do not ask you,” replied Manfred, “what she thinks +about her father; but you are in her secrets. Come, be a good +girl and tell me; is there any young man - ha! - you understand me.”<br> +<br> +“Lord bless me! understand your Highness? no, not I. I told +her a few vulnerary herbs and repose - ”<br> +<br> +“I am not talking,” replied the Prince, impatiently, “about +her father; I know he will do well.”<br> +<br> +“Bless me, I rejoice to hear your Highness say so; for though +I thought it not right to let my young Lady despond, methought his greatness +had a wan look, and a something - I remember when young Ferdinand was +wounded by the Venetian - ”<br> +<br> + “Thou answerest from the point,” interrupted Manfred; +“but here, take this jewel, perhaps that may fix thy attention +- nay, no reverences; my favour shall not stop here - come, tell me +truly; how stands Isabella’s heart?”<br> +<br> +“Well! your Highness has such a way!” said Bianca, “to +be sure - but can your Highness keep a secret? if it should ever come +out of your lips - ”<br> +<br> +“It shall not, it shall not,” cried Manfred.<br> +<br> +“Nay, but swear, your Highness.”<br> +<br> +“By my halidame, if it should ever be known that I said it - ”<br> +<br> +“Why, truth is truth, I do not think my Lady Isabella ever much +affectioned my young Lord your son; yet he was a sweet youth as one +should see; I am sure, if I had been a Princess - but bless me! +I must attend my Lady Matilda; she will marvel what is become of me.”<br> +<br> +“Stay,” cried Manfred; “thou hast not satisfied my +question. Hast thou ever carried any message, any letter?”<br> +<br> +“I! good gracious!” cried Bianca; “I carry a letter? +I would not to be a Queen. I hope your Highness thinks, though +I am poor, I am honest. Did your Highness never hear what Count +Marsigli offered me, when he came a wooing to my Lady Matilda?”<br> +<br> +“I have not leisure,” said Manfred, “to listen to +thy tale. I do not question thy honesty. But it is thy duty +to conceal nothing from me. How long has Isabella been acquainted +with Theodore?”<br> +<br> +“Nay, there is nothing can escape your Highness!” said Bianca; +“not that I know any thing of the matter. Theodore, to be +sure, is a proper young man, and, as my Lady Matilda says, the very +image of good Alfonso. Has not your Highness remarked it?”<br> +<br> +“Yes, yes, - No - thou torturest me,” said Manfred. +“Where did they meet? when?”<br> +<br> +“Who! my Lady Matilda?” said Bianca.<br> +<br> +“No, no, not Matilda: Isabella; when did Isabella first become +acquainted with this Theodore!”<br> +<br> +“Virgin Mary!” said Bianca, “how should I know?”<br> +<br> +“Thou dost know,” said Manfred; “and I must know; +I will - ”<br> +<br> +“Lord! your Highness is not jealous of young Theodore!” +said Bianca.<br> +<br> +“Jealous! no, no. Why should I be jealous? perhaps I mean +to unite them - If I were sure Isabella would have no repugnance.”<br> +<br> +“Repugnance! no, I’ll warrant her,” said Bianca; “he +is as comely a youth as ever trod on Christian ground. We are +all in love with him; there is not a soul in the castle but would be +rejoiced to have him for our Prince - I mean, when it shall please heaven +to call your Highness to itself.”<br> +<br> +“Indeed!” said Manfred, “has it gone so far! oh! this +cursed Friar! - but I must not lose time - go, Bianca, attend Isabella; +but I charge thee, not a word of what has passed. Find out how +she is affected towards Theodore; bring me good news, and that ring +has a companion. Wait at the foot of the winding staircase: I +am going to visit the Marquis, and will talk further with thee at my +return.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, after some general conversation, desired Frederic to dismiss +the two Knights, his companions, having to talk with him on urgent affairs.<br> +<br> +As soon as they were alone, he began in artful guise to sound the Marquis +on the subject of Matilda; and finding him disposed to his wish, he +let drop hints on the difficulties that would attend the celebration +of their marriage, unless - At that instant Bianca burst into the room +with a wildness in her look and gestures that spoke the utmost terror.<br> +<br> +“Oh! my Lord, my Lord!” cried she; “we are all undone! +it is come again! it is come again!”<br> +<br> +“What is come again?” cried Manfred amazed.<br> +<br> +“Oh! the hand! the Giant! the hand! - support me! I am terrified +out of my senses,” cried Bianca. “I will not sleep +in the castle to-night. Where shall I go? my things may come after +me to-morrow - would I had been content to wed Francesco! this comes +of ambition!”<br> +<br> +“What has terrified thee thus, young woman?” said the Marquis. +“Thou art safe here; be not alarmed.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! your Greatness is wonderfully good,” said Bianca, “but +I dare not - no, pray let me go - I had rather leave everything behind +me, than stay another hour under this roof.”<br> +<br> +“Go to, thou hast lost thy senses,” said Manfred. +“Interrupt us not; we were communing on important matters - My +Lord, this wench is subject to fits - Come with me, Bianca.”<br> +<br> +“Oh! the Saints! No,” said Bianca, “for certain +it comes to warn your Highness; why should it appear to me else? +I say my prayers morning and evening - oh! if your Highness had believed +Diego! ’Tis the same hand that he saw the foot to in the +gallery-chamber - Father Jerome has often told us the prophecy would +be out one of these days - ‘Bianca,’ said he, ‘mark +my words - ’”<br> +<br> +“Thou ravest,” said Manfred, in a rage; “be gone, +and keep these fooleries to frighten thy companions.”<br> +<br> +“What! my Lord,” cried Bianca, “do you think I have +seen nothing? go to the foot of the great stairs yourself - as I live +I saw it.”<br> +<br> +“Saw what? tell us, fair maid, what thou hast seen,” said +Frederic.<br> +<br> +“Can your Highness listen,” said Manfred, “to the +delirium of a silly wench, who has heard stories of apparitions until +she believes them?”<br> +<br> +“This is more than fancy,” said the Marquis; “her +terror is too natural and too strongly impressed to be the work of imagination. +Tell us, fair maiden, what it is has moved thee thus?”<br> +<br> +“Yes, my Lord, thank your Greatness,” said Bianca; “I +believe I look very pale; I shall be better when I have recovered myself +- I was going to my Lady Isabella’s chamber, by his Highness’s +order - ”<br> +<br> +“We do not want the circumstances,” interrupted Manfred. +“Since his Highness will have it so, proceed; but be brief.”<br> +<br> +“Lord! your Highness thwarts one so!” replied Bianca; “I +fear my hair - I am sure I never in my life - well! as I was telling +your Greatness, I was going by his Highness’s order to my Lady +Isabella’s chamber; she lies in the watchet-coloured chamber, +on the right hand, one pair of stairs: so when I came to the great stairs +- I was looking on his Highness’s present here - ”<br> +<br> +“Grant me patience!” said Manfred, “will this wench +never come to the point? what imports it to the Marquis, that I gave +thee a bauble for thy faithful attendance on my daughter? we want to +know what thou sawest.”<br> +<br> +“I was going to tell your Highness,” said Bianca, “if +you would permit me. So as I was rubbing the ring - I am sure +I had not gone up three steps, but I heard the rattling of armour; for +all the world such a clatter as Diego says he heard when the Giant turned +him about in the gallery-chamber.”<br> +<br> +“What Giant is this, my Lord?” said the Marquis; “is +your castle haunted by giants and goblins?”<br> +<br> +“Lord! what, has not your Greatness heard the story of the Giant +in the gallery-chamber?” cried Bianca. “I marvel his +Highness has not told you; mayhap you do not know there is a prophecy +- ”<br> +<br> +“This trifling is intolerable,” interrupted Manfred. +“Let us dismiss this silly wench, my Lord! we have more important +affairs to discuss.”<br> +<br> +“By your favour,” said Frederic, “these are no trifles. +The enormous sabre I was directed to in the wood, yon casque, its fellow +- are these visions of this poor maiden’s brain?”<br> +<br> +“So Jaquez thinks, may it please your Greatness,” said Bianca. +“He says this moon will not be out without our seeing some strange +revolution. For my part, I should not be surprised if it was to +happen to-morrow; for, as I was saying, when I heard the clattering +of armour, I was all in a cold sweat. I looked up, and, if your +Greatness will believe me, I saw upon the uppermost banister of the +great stairs a hand in armour as big as big. I thought I should +have swooned. I never stopped until I came hither - would I were +well out of this castle. My Lady Matilda told me but yester-morning +that her Highness Hippolita knows something.”<br> +<br> +“Thou art an insolent!” cried Manfred. “Lord +Marquis, it much misgives me that this scene is concerted to affront +me. Are my own domestics suborned to spread tales injurious to +my honour? Pursue your claim by manly daring; or let us bury our +feuds, as was proposed, by the intermarriage of our children. +But trust me, it ill becomes a Prince of your bearing to practise on +mercenary wenches.”<br> +<br> +“I scorn your imputation,” said Frederic. “Until +this hour I never set eyes on this damsel: I have given her no jewel. +My Lord, my Lord, your conscience, your guilt accuses you, and would +throw the suspicion on me; but keep your daughter, and think no more +of Isabella. The judgments already fallen on your house forbid +me matching into it.”<br> +<br> +Manfred, alarmed at the resolute tone in which Frederic delivered these +words, endeavoured to pacify him. Dismissing Bianca, he made such +submissions to the Marquis, and threw in such artful encomiums on Matilda, +that Frederic was once more staggered. However, as his passion +was of so recent a date, it could not at once surmount the scruples +he had conceived. He had gathered enough from Bianca’s discourse +to persuade him that heaven declared itself against Manfred. The +proposed marriages too removed his claim to a distance; and the principality +of Otranto was a stronger temptation than the contingent reversion of +it with Matilda. Still he would not absolutely recede from his +engagements; but purposing to gain time, he demanded of Manfred if it +was true in fact that Hippolita consented to the divorce. The +Prince, transported to find no other obstacle, and depending on his +influence over his wife, assured the Marquis it was so, and that he +might satisfy himself of the truth from her own mouth.<br> +<br> +As they were thus discoursing, word was brought that the banquet was +prepared. Manfred conducted Frederic to the great hall, where +they were received by Hippolita and the young Princesses. Manfred +placed the Marquis next to Matilda, and seated himself between his wife +and Isabella. Hippolita comported herself with an easy gravity; +but the young ladies were silent and melancholy. Manfred, who +was determined to pursue his point with the Marquis in the remainder +of the evening, pushed on the feast until it waxed late; affecting unrestrained +gaiety, and plying Frederic with repeated goblets of wine. The +latter, more upon his guard than Manfred wished, declined his frequent +challenges, on pretence of his late loss of blood; while the Prince, +to raise his own disordered spirits, and to counterfeit unconcern, indulged +himself in plentiful draughts, though not to the intoxication of his +senses.<br> +<br> +The evening being far advanced, the banquet concluded. Manfred +would have withdrawn with Frederic; but the latter pleading weakness +and want of repose, retired to his chamber, gallantly telling the Prince +that his daughter should amuse his Highness until himself could attend +him. Manfred accepted the party, and to the no small grief of +Isabella, accompanied her to her apartment. Matilda waited on +her mother to enjoy the freshness of the evening on the ramparts of +the castle.<br> +<br> +Soon as the company were dispersed their several ways, Frederic, quitting +his chamber, inquired if Hippolita was alone, and was told by one of +her attendants, who had not noticed her going forth, that at that hour +she generally withdrew to her oratory, where he probably would find +her. The Marquis, during the repast, had beheld Matilda with increase +of passion. He now wished to find Hippolita in the disposition +her Lord had promised. The portents that had alarmed him were +forgotten in his desires. Stealing softly and unobserved to the +apartment of Hippolita, he entered it with a resolution to encourage +her acquiescence to the divorce, having perceived that Manfred was resolved +to make the possession of Isabella an unalterable condition, before +he would grant Matilda to his wishes.<br> +<br> +The Marquis was not surprised at the silence that reigned in the Princess’s +apartment. Concluding her, as he had been advertised, in her oratory, +he passed on. The door was ajar; the evening gloomy and overcast. +Pushing open the door gently, he saw a person kneeling before the altar. +As he approached nearer, it seemed not a woman, but one in a long woollen +weed, whose back was towards him. The person seemed absorbed in +prayer. The Marquis was about to return, when the figure, rising, +stood some moments fixed in meditation, without regarding him. +The Marquis, expecting the holy person to come forth, and meaning to +excuse his uncivil interruption, said,<br> +<br> +“Reverend Father, I sought the Lady Hippolita.”<br> +<br> +“Hippolita!” replied a hollow voice; “camest thou +to this castle to seek Hippolita?” and then the figure, turning +slowly round, discovered to Frederic the fleshless jaws and empty sockets +of a skeleton, wrapt in a hermit’s cowl.<br> +<br> +“Angels of grace protect me!” cried Frederic, recoiling.<br> +<br> +“Deserve their protection!” said the Spectre. Frederic, +falling on his knees, adjured the phantom to take pity on him.<br> +<br> +“Dost thou not remember me?” said the apparition. +“Remember the wood of Joppa!”<br> +<br> +“Art thou that holy hermit?” cried Frederic, trembling. +“Can I do aught for thy eternal peace?”<br> +<br> +“Wast thou delivered from bondage,” said the spectre, “to +pursue carnal delights? Hast thou forgotten the buried sabre, +and the behest of Heaven engraven on it?”<br> +<br> +“I have not, I have not,” said Frederic; “but say, +blest spirit, what is thy errand to me? What remains to be done?”<br> +<br> +“To forget Matilda!” said the apparition; and vanished.<br> +<br> +Frederic’s blood froze in his veins. For some minutes he +remained motionless. Then falling prostrate on his face before +the altar, he besought the intercession of every saint for pardon. +A flood of tears succeeded to this transport; and the image of the beauteous +Matilda rushing in spite of him on his thoughts, he lay on the ground +in a conflict of penitence and passion. Ere he could recover from +this agony of his spirits, the Princess Hippolita with a taper in her +hand entered the oratory alone. Seeing a man without motion on +the floor, she gave a shriek, concluding him dead. Her fright +brought Frederic to himself. Rising suddenly, his face bedewed +with tears, he would have rushed from her presence; but Hippolita stopping +him, conjured him in the most plaintive accents to explain the cause +of his disorder, and by what strange chance she had found him there +in that posture.<br> +<br> +“Ah, virtuous Princess!” said the Marquis, penetrated with +grief, and stopped.<br> +<br> +“For the love of Heaven, my Lord,” said Hippolita, “disclose +the cause of this transport! What mean these doleful sounds, this +alarming exclamation on my name? What woes has heaven still in +store for the wretched Hippolita? Yet silent! By every pitying +angel, I adjure thee, noble Prince,” continued she, falling at +his feet, “to disclose the purport of what lies at thy heart. +I see thou feelest for me; thou feelest the sharp pangs that thou inflictest +- speak, for pity! Does aught thou knowest concern my child?”<br> +<br> +“I cannot speak,” cried Frederic, bursting from her. +“Oh, Matilda!”<br> +<br> +Quitting the Princess thus abruptly, he hastened to his own apartment. +At the door of it he was accosted by Manfred, who flushed by wine and +love had come to seek him, and to propose to waste some hours of the +night in music and revelling. Frederic, offended at an invitation +so dissonant from the mood of his soul, pushed him rudely aside, and +entering his chamber, flung the door intemperately against Manfred, +and bolted it inwards. The haughty Prince, enraged at this unaccountable +behaviour, withdrew in a frame of mind capable of the most fatal excesses. +As he crossed the court, he was met by the domestic whom he had planted +at the convent as a spy on Jerome and Theodore. This man, almost +breathless with the haste he had made, informed his Lord that Theodore, +and some lady from the castle were, at that instant, in private conference +at the tomb of Alfonso in St. Nicholas’s church. He had +dogged Theodore thither, but the gloominess of the night had prevented +his discovering who the woman was.<br> +<br> +Manfred, whose spirits were inflamed, and whom Isabella had driven from +her on his urging his passion with too little reserve, did not doubt +but the inquietude she had expressed had been occasioned by her impatience +to meet Theodore. Provoked by this conjecture, and enraged at +her father, he hastened secretly to the great church. Gliding +softly between the aisles, and guided by an imperfect gleam of moonshine +that shone faintly through the illuminated windows, he stole towards +the tomb of Alfonso, to which he was directed by indistinct whispers +of the persons he sought. The first sounds he could distinguish +were -<br> +<br> +“Does it, alas! depend on me? Manfred will never permit +our union.”<br> +<br> +“No, this shall prevent it!” cried the tyrant, drawing his +dagger, and plunging it over her shoulder into the bosom of the person +that spoke.<br> +<br> +“Ah, me, I am slain!” cried Matilda, sinking. “Good +heaven, receive my soul!”<br> +<br> +“Savage, inhuman monster, what hast thou done!” cried Theodore, +rushing on him, and wrenching his dagger from him.<br> +<br> +“Stop, stop thy impious hand!” cried Matilda; “it +is my father!”<br> +<br> +Manfred, waking as from a trance, beat his breast, twisted his hands +in his locks, and endeavoured to recover his dagger from Theodore to +despatch himself. Theodore, scarce less distracted, and only mastering +the transports of his grief to assist Matilda, had now by his cries +drawn some of the monks to his aid. While part of them endeavoured, +in concert with the afflicted Theodore, to stop the blood of the dying +Princess, the rest prevented Manfred from laying violent hands on himself.<br> +<br> +Matilda, resigning herself patiently to her fate, acknowledged with +looks of grateful love the zeal of Theodore. Yet oft as her faintness +would permit her speech its way, she begged the assistants to comfort +her father. Jerome, by this time, had learnt the fatal news, and +reached the church. His looks seemed to reproach Theodore, but +turning to Manfred, he said,<br> +<br> +“Now, tyrant! behold the completion of woe fulfilled on thy impious +and devoted head! The blood of Alfonso cried to heaven for vengeance; +and heaven has permitted its altar to be polluted by assassination, +that thou mightest shed thy own blood at the foot of that Prince’s +sepulchre!”<br> +<br> +“Cruel man!” cried Matilda, “to aggravate the woes +of a parent; may heaven bless my father, and forgive him as I do! +My Lord, my gracious Sire, dost thou forgive thy child? Indeed, +I came not hither to meet Theodore. I found him praying at this +tomb, whither my mother sent me to intercede for thee, for her - dearest +father, bless your child, and say you forgive her.”<br> +<br> +“Forgive thee! Murderous monster!” cried Manfred, +“can assassins forgive? I took thee for Isabella; but heaven +directed my bloody hand to the heart of my child. Oh, Matilda! +- I cannot utter it - canst thou forgive the blindness of my rage?”<br> +<br> +“I can, I do; and may heaven confirm it!” said Matilda; +“but while I have life to ask it - oh! my mother! what will she +feel? Will you comfort her, my Lord? Will you not put her +away? Indeed she loves you! Oh, I am faint! bear me to the +castle. Can I live to have her close my eyes?”<br> +<br> +Theodore and the monks besought her earnestly to suffer herself to be +borne into the convent; but her instances were so pressing to be carried +to the castle, that placing her on a litter, they conveyed her thither +as she requested. Theodore, supporting her head with his arm, +and hanging over her in an agony of despairing love, still endeavoured +to inspire her with hopes of life. Jerome, on the other side, +comforted her with discourses of heaven, and holding a crucifix before +her, which she bathed with innocent tears, prepared her for her passage +to immortality. Manfred, plunged in the deepest affliction, followed +the litter in despair.<br> +<br> +Ere they reached the castle, Hippolita, informed of the dreadful catastrophe, +had flown to meet her murdered child; but when she saw the afflicted +procession, the mightiness of her grief deprived her of her senses, +and she fell lifeless to the earth in a swoon. Isabella and Frederic, +who attended her, were overwhelmed in almost equal sorrow. Matilda +alone seemed insensible to her own situation: every thought was lost +in tenderness for her mother.<br> +<br> +Ordering the litter to stop, as soon as Hippolita was brought to herself, +she asked for her father. He approached, unable to speak. +Matilda, seizing his hand and her mother’s, locked them in her +own, and then clasped them to her heart. Manfred could not support +this act of pathetic piety. He dashed himself on the ground, and +cursed the day he was born. Isabella, apprehensive that these +struggles of passion were more than Matilda could support, took upon +herself to order Manfred to be borne to his apartment, while she caused +Matilda to be conveyed to the nearest chamber. Hippolita, scarce +more alive than her daughter, was regardless of everything but her; +but when the tender Isabella’s care would have likewise removed +her, while the surgeons examined Matilda’s wound, she cried,<br> +<br> +“Remove me! never, never! I lived but in her, and will expire +with her.”<br> +<br> +Matilda raised her eyes at her mother’s voice, but closed them +again without speaking. Her sinking pulse and the damp coldness +of her hand soon dispelled all hopes of recovery. Theodore followed +the surgeons into the outer chamber, and heard them pronounce the fatal +sentence with a transport equal to frenzy.<br> +<br> +“Since she cannot live mine,” cried he, “at least +she shall be mine in death! Father! Jerome! will you not +join our hands?” cried he to the Friar, who, with the Marquis, +had accompanied the surgeons.<br> +<br> +“What means thy distracted rashness?” said Jerome. +“Is this an hour for marriage?”<br> +<br> +“It is, it is,” cried Theodore. “Alas! there +is no other!”<br> +<br> +“Young man, thou art too unadvised,” said Frederic. +“Dost thou think we are to listen to thy fond transports in this +hour of fate? What pretensions hast thou to the Princess?”<br> +<br> +“Those of a Prince,” said Theodore; “of the sovereign +of Otranto. This reverend man, my father, has informed me who +I am.”<br> +<br> +“Thou ravest,” said the Marquis. “There is no +Prince of Otranto but myself, now Manfred, by murder, by sacrilegious +murder, has forfeited all pretensions.”<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said Jerome, assuming an air of command, “he +tells you true. It was not my purpose the secret should have been +divulged so soon, but fate presses onward to its work. What his +hot-headed passion has revealed, my tongue confirms. Know, Prince, +that when Alfonso set sail for the Holy Land - ”<br> +<br> +“Is this a season for explanations?” cried Theodore. +“Father, come and unite me to the Princess; she shall be mine! +In every other thing I will dutifully obey you. My life! my adored +Matilda!” continued Theodore, rushing back into the inner chamber, +“will you not be mine? Will you not bless your - ”<br> +<br> +Isabella made signs to him to be silent, apprehending the Princess was +near her end.<br> +<br> +“What, is she dead?” cried Theodore; “is it possible!”<br> +<br> +The violence of his exclamations brought Matilda to herself. Lifting +up her eyes, she looked round for her mother.<br> +<br> +“Life of my soul, I am here!” cried Hippolita; “think +not I will quit thee!”<br> +<br> +“Oh! you are too good,” said Matilda. “But weep +not for me, my mother! I am going where sorrow never dwells - +Isabella, thou hast loved me; wouldst thou not supply my fondness to +this dear, dear woman? Indeed I am faint!”<br> +<br> +“Oh! my child! my child!” said Hippolita in a flood of tears, +“can I not withhold thee a moment?”<br> +<br> +“It will not be,” said Matilda; “commend me to heaven +- Where is my father? forgive him, dearest mother - forgive him my death; +it was an error. Oh! I had forgotten - dearest mother, I +vowed never to see Theodore more - perhaps that has drawn down this +calamity - but it was not intentional - can you pardon me?”<br> +<br> +“Oh! wound not my agonising soul!” said Hippolita; “thou +never couldst offend me - Alas! she faints! help! help!”<br> +<br> +“I would say something more,” said Matilda, struggling, +“but it cannot be - Isabella - Theodore - for my sake - Oh! - +” she expired.<br> +<br> +Isabella and her women tore Hippolita from the corse; but Theodore threatened +destruction to all who attempted to remove him from it. He printed +a thousand kisses on her clay-cold hands, and uttered every expression +that despairing love could dictate.<br> +<br> +Isabella, in the meantime, was accompanying the afflicted Hippolita +to her apartment; but, in the middle of the court, they were met by +Manfred, who, distracted with his own thoughts, and anxious once more +to behold his daughter, was advancing to the chamber where she lay. +As the moon was now at its height, he read in the countenances of this +unhappy company the event he dreaded.<br> +<br> +“What! is she dead?” cried he in wild confusion. A +clap of thunder at that instant shook the castle to its foundations; +the earth rocked, and the clank of more than mortal armour was heard +behind. Frederic and Jerome thought the last day was at hand. +The latter, forcing Theodore along with them, rushed into the court. +The moment Theodore appeared, the walls of the castle behind Manfred +were thrown down with a mighty force, and the form of Alfonso, dilated +to an immense magnitude, appeared in the centre of the ruins.<br> +<br> +“Behold in Theodore the true heir of Alfonso!” said the +vision: And having pronounced those words, accompanied by a clap of +thunder, it ascended solemnly towards heaven, where the clouds parting +asunder, the form of St. Nicholas was seen, and receiving Alfonso’s +shade, they were soon wrapt from mortal eyes in a blaze of glory.<br> +<br> +The beholders fell prostrate on their faces, acknowledging the divine +will. The first that broke silence was Hippolita.<br> +<br> +“My Lord,” said she to the desponding Manfred, “behold +the vanity of human greatness! Conrad is gone! Matilda is +no more! In Theodore we view the true Prince of Otranto. +By what miracle he is so I know not - suffice it to us, our doom is +pronounced! shall we not, can we but dedicate the few deplorable hours +we have to live, in deprecating the further wrath of heaven? heaven +ejects us - whither can we fly, but to yon holy cells that yet offer +us a retreat.”<br> +<br> +“Thou guiltless but unhappy woman! unhappy by my crimes!” +replied Manfred, “my heart at last is open to thy devout admonitions. +Oh! could - but it cannot be - ye are lost in wonder - let me at last +do justice on myself! To heap shame on my own head is all the +satisfaction I have left to offer to offended heaven. My story +has drawn down these judgments: Let my confession atone - but, ah! what +can atone for usurpation and a murdered child? a child murdered in a +consecrated place? List, sirs, and may this bloody record be a +warning to future tyrants!”<br> +<br> +“Alfonso, ye all know, died in the Holy Land - ye would interrupt +me; ye would say he came not fairly to his end - it is most true - why +else this bitter cup which Manfred must drink to the dregs. Ricardo, +my grandfather, was his chamberlain - I would draw a veil over my ancestor’s +crimes - but it is in vain! Alfonso died by poison. A fictitious +will declared Ricardo his heir. His crimes pursued him - yet he +lost no Conrad, no Matilda! I pay the price of usurpation for +all! A storm overtook him. Haunted by his guilt he vowed +to St. Nicholas to found a church and two convents, if he lived to reach +Otranto. The sacrifice was accepted: the saint appeared to him +in a dream, and promised that Ricardo’s posterity should reign +in Otranto until the rightful owner should be grown too large to inhabit +the castle, and as long as issue male from Ricardo’s loins should +remain to enjoy it - alas! alas! nor male nor female, except myself, +remains of all his wretched race! I have done - the woes of these +three days speak the rest. How this young man can be Alfonso’s +heir I know not - yet I do not doubt it. His are these dominions; +I resign them - yet I knew not Alfonso had an heir - I question not +the will of heaven - poverty and prayer must fill up the woeful space, +until Manfred shall be summoned to Ricardo.”<br> +<br> +“What remains is my part to declare,” said Jerome. +“When Alfonso set sail for the Holy Land he was driven by a storm +to the coast of Sicily. The other vessel, which bore Ricardo and +his train, as your Lordship must have heard, was separated from him.”<br> +<br> +“It is most true,” said Manfred; “and the title you +give me is more than an outcast can claim - well! be it so - proceed.”<br> +<br> +Jerome blushed, and continued. “For three months Lord Alfonso +was wind-bound in Sicily. There he became enamoured of a fair +virgin named Victoria. He was too pious to tempt her to forbidden +pleasures. They were married. Yet deeming this amour incongruous +with the holy vow of arms by which he was bound, he determined to conceal +their nuptials until his return from the Crusade, when he purposed to +seek and acknowledge her for his lawful wife. He left her pregnant. +During his absence she was delivered of a daughter. But scarce +had she felt a mother’s pangs ere she heard the fatal rumour of +her Lord’s death, and the succession of Ricardo. What could +a friendless, helpless woman do? Would her testimony avail? - +yet, my lord, I have an authentic writing - ”<br> +<br> +“It needs not,” said Manfred; “the horrors of these +days, the vision we have but now seen, all corroborate thy evidence +beyond a thousand parchments. Matilda’s death and my expulsion +- ”<br> +<br> +“Be composed, my Lord,” said Hippolita; “this holy +man did not mean to recall your griefs.” Jerome proceeded.<br> +<br> +“I shall not dwell on what is needless. The daughter of +which Victoria was delivered, was at her maturity bestowed in marriage +on me. Victoria died; and the secret remained locked in my breast. +Theodore’s narrative has told the rest.”<br> +<br> +The Friar ceased. The disconsolate company retired to the remaining +part of the castle. In the morning Manfred signed his abdication +of the principality, with the approbation of Hippolita, and each took +on them the habit of religion in the neighbouring convents. Frederic +offered his daughter to the new Prince, which Hippolita’s tenderness +for Isabella concurred to promote. But Theodore’s grief +was too fresh to admit the thought of another love; and it was not until +after frequent discourses with Isabella of his dear Matilda, that he +was persuaded he could know no happiness but in the society of one with +whom he could for ever indulge the melancholy that had taken possession +of his soul.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE CASTLE OF OTRANTO ***<br> +<pre> + +******This file should be named cotrt10h.htm or cotrt10h.zip****** +Corrected EDITIONS of our EBooks get a new NUMBER, cotrt11h.htm +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, cotrt10ah.htm + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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